


Men at work

by bunnysworld



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Falling In Love, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-18
Updated: 2016-08-18
Packaged: 2018-08-09 14:11:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 40,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7804858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bunnysworld/pseuds/bunnysworld
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin watches the construction at the building across the street every day. He’s not very interested in the process of building as such, but the workers are lookers. Every gay man’s dream comes true when one of them approaches him. Not even the secret the construction worker has keeps Merlin from falling in love but will a terrible accident tear everything they have built apart?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Men at work

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LFB72](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LFB72/gifts), [texasfandoodler](https://archiveofourown.org/users/texasfandoodler/gifts).



> Since this is my contribution to this year's After Camlann Big Bang, it's time for the Oscar speech:
> 
> Thanks! Thank you everyone who was involved with this story. To the people who thought this plot bunny was worth writing ages ago, so the idea never got deleted or forgotten. Thanks to the mods who once again let me play in their playground. Thanks to issy, who once again battled my version of English to make it readable for everyone else; where would I be without you? Everything still in there is entirely my own version of English :D And a huge thank you to my wonderful artist LFB72. Without you, this story would not have been finished. Your enthusiasm pulled me out of my lethargy more than once and made me go on. Your drawings are wonderful and I love every single one of them. Thanks for bearing with me. It’s been a great journey. 
> 
>  
> 
> August 2017: Photobucket, where LFB72 has been hosting her art, totally screws up. At this point in time, the art can't be seen. As soon as she found a solution, the art will be here again. Please come back to check for it, it's wonderful and it belongs to the story.  
> As you all know, this year we lost Tex and I still can’t believe she’s gone. She not only saved my behind on the Big Bang two years ago, she was a wonderful person and I am still devastated that a friend and fantastic artist had to leave us so soon. I miss you, dear, and maybe, just maybe you sit on your cloud and it makes you smile that there’s a little character in this story that bears your name. 
> 
> Of course the characters (but for one) belong to the BBC and Shine. We just took them out to play a little, dusted them off and put them back later. No copyright infringement intended. This is for fun, not for profit. 
> 
> Go over to [LFB72](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7779715) and show her your love for her amazing drawings!

 

Merlin smiled as he entered the sandwich shop again. His two weeks of leave had been nice and he loved that he got to spend one of them with his mother and the other in the south of France. Having to go back to work wasn’t usually something Merlin would smile about. But when he got his little tray with his latte macchiato and the salmon sandwich that was usually his breakfast and found a seat at the window, he found out that the construction on the new building across the street was progressing, but still in full swing. 

Pulling out his Ipad so he could at least pretend to read the latest online edition of the newspaper, he checked the construction site. Ah, there was the tall one who seemed to only consist of muscles and over there the short one with the longish hair. Merlin knew the man wasn’t really short, but compared to the giant with the short-cropped hair, everyone would look like a dwarf. One after one, Merlin checked off his list of good-looking construction workers to find they were all still there after two weeks of his absence. 

As much as he loved having his first meal of the day on his way to work at the cafe, getting to look at all these gorgeous men was an added bonus. And to top it off, the architect seemed to be there, too. He was the only one in a decent v-neck t-shirt and non-dirty jeans, but looked just as hot as the workers with his wild curls sticking out from underneath a white hard hat as he unrolled some blueprints and talked to…Merlin nearly swallowed his latte the wrong way when he spotted him. 

A tall, blond bloke, in what seemed to be the uniform of construction workers in summer. A sleeveless t-shirt that might have been white at some point in the past, jeans that had more holes than thread to keep them together, an orange safety vest, the ever-present tool-belt, gloves and steel-toed boots.

Mesmerized, Merlin watched as the man pointed at something on the blueprint, nodded and put his hard hat back on. Pulling himself together, ignoring the looks of the man next to him – if a little grunt had escaped him, so what? – he took another sip of his coffee, his paper long forgotten. Even though the other men at this construction site were lookers, this bloke put them all to shame, he was just gorgeous, godly, Merlin wouldn’t have been surprised if there had been an ethereal golden glow around him. He had to be new, otherwise Merlin would have spotted him already. 

The buzz of his mobile once again jerked him back to reality, it was time to go. Finishing his latte, Merlin stuffed the rest of his barely touched sandwich back into the box, found his tie in his backpack, put it around his neck, shrugged into his jacket and left.

All the stuff on his desk that piled up while he was on vacation took his mind off the construction workers but as soon as lunch time came around, Merlin disposed of his tie and jacket again, rolled up his sleeves and made his way to the sandwich shop. He found a spot at the window again and busied himself with his juice and once again pretended to read on his Ipad. Of course he’d spotted the workers across the street right away. They sat in the shade, obviously taking a break, too. The tall one was there and the long-haired one - they only seemed to come in a pair, Merlin had never seen them separated - talked while the one with the beautiful ebony skin read some yellow press paper. Even the architect was still there, discussing something with the other dark-haired worker. 

Merlin knew he should have given them names to keep them apart, but it felt wrong to just give them names that weren’t their own. 

But where was the blond? Disappointment crawled up Merlin’s spine. He knew he had been there this morning, so where was he now? He was so busy searching the site for him, that he nearly fell off his stool when the blond passed by the window. Jesus H. Christ on a bicycle, he was even more gorgeous up close. 

The man came back into sight a short while later on the other side of the road again and Merlin couldn’t do anything but stare as the bloke took his hard hat off, wiped sweat off his forehead and unscrewed his juice bottle. Merlin’s world came to a halt when the man put the bottle to his lips and tilted his head back to drink. He swallowed hard and all he could see was the guy’s Adam’s apple bop as he drank. Biting his lower lip, Merlin squirmed in his seat, his pants so tight that he couldn’t get up now without totally embarrassing himself. He readjusted his Ipad and snapped a few photos of the bloke for later…reference. 

After a moment, the man across the street sat down in the shade with his colleagues and Merlin tore his eyes away long enough to pick at the fruit salad that made his lunch. What was he doing here? There was a difference between enjoying the sight of gorgeous construction workers that happened to be there and growing a boner perving over one of them. 

When he had calmed down enough, he grabbed his stuff and with one last look at the workers, he made his way back to the office. There was a lot of stuff waiting for him.

Had Merlin only had his breakfast at the sandwich shop before, it became a habit to have lunch there, too. And nobody would judge him if he had a smoothie before he took the tube back home, right?

Sometimes the sight of the blond god was too much and Merlin had to rush back to the office, find an empty bathroom and take care of business before he could concentrate on anything other than the blond hair, the broad shoulders, the strong legs that he so desperately wanted to have wrapped around his own body. He knew his obsession was far from healthy, especially since he didn’t plan to act upon it. The construction on the building would be done soon, or rather the part that these fellas were busy with, they’d leave and a different crew would come in to do the rest of the work. But which gay man didn’t have fantasies about good-looking construction workers once in a while?

But when Saturday arrived, Merlin found himself on his way to the sandwich shop again. He could get his Ipad that he’d left at the office on Friday and there was no harm in having a coffee at the sandwich shop, was there? So he put on the tight jeans that were usually reserved for going out clubbing and a nice t-shirt and after retrieving his ‘forgotten’ Ipad, he bought a coffee and sat at his usual place by the window. And as he expected, the workers all were there. 

 

All throughout the week, one of the construction workers had come to the coffee shop while he was there, buying fancy sandwiches and coffee, Merlin had wondered how they could afford it. They all worked hard and needed to fuel their bodies with a lot more food than Merlin could ever imagine eating. But even he noticed that eating at this shop three times a day cut into his budget and he was sure that those blokes didn’t make as much money as he did. Nevertheless one of them showed up to get lunch for all of them. 

But it was never the blond, so Merlin watched from afar how he wiped his brow, how he shoved his hard hat back, how he stuffed his gloves in the back pocket of his worn dirty jeans. He watched the tall one haul heavy things about and grinned each time the one with the longish hair twirled his hammer like it was a sword or a revolver or something. He couldn’t hold back the giggle that one time hammer-guy hit his own thumb while showing off, even though Merlin knew it was far from funny. Even the architect was fun to watch, running about with blue prints, discussing stuff and laughing with the tall muscly bloke. 

Merlin’s coffee got cold and he didn’t even notice that time passed and the worker’s lunch break came around. He was so wrapped up in following the blond with his eyes. So he jumped a little when the tall one pushed the door to the sandwich shop open and grinned widely at him. Blushing, Merlin nodded and took a large gulp of his macchiato. Only to pull a face, it was ice cold by now. 

Fiddling with his Ipad, Merlin felt caught. But of course. If he could see them from where he sat, they would see him, too, right? His tips of his ears still burned when the tall one passed him again. 

“We’ll be done in two hours.”

Gaping, Merlin watched the door close and the muscly worker cross the street again, the white paper bag with sandwiches and whatnots looking ridiculously out of place in his big hand. 

Had that been…yeah, what had that been? Why had he told him that they would finish up in two hours? To warn him that the show would be over? To let him know that they knew he was watching? It didn’t sound as if they minded, but…Merlin was utterly confused. 

He had been caught. Then again, was it a crime to have sandwiches and coffee here? No, it wasn’t. Just as it wasn’t a crime to like this seat by the window. This was a free country, he could look wherever he wanted!

Yet, he busied himself with his alibi-Ipad, looking at all the stalker photos he had snapped last week, most of them of the blond and once again, he was so wrapped up that he didn’t even notice the time passing. 

“Hi.”

Merlin dropped the Ipad to the table and blushed when he noticed that the blond from his photos was standing right next to him. “Err…hi.”

The blond chuckled. “Is this seat taken?”

Looking around, Merlin noticed that the place was almost deserted, there were lots of empty tables. “Err…no.” He made an inviting gesture with his hand, then grabbed his Ipad and turned it around onto its display as the blond put his tray on the table, took his hard hat off and ran a hand through his hair that immediately went from being flattened to sticking out in every direction. Merlin smiled. 

“You’re done for today?” Oh no! Merlin blushed again. He’d just given away that he knew very well what the blond did for a living and that he had watched him. 

“Yup, just as Percy said. He’s good with judging how long a certain job takes.” 

Merlin stared as the other took a large gulp of his water bottle. “Percy…”

“The tall bloke? Short hair? All muscles? He was in here about two hours ago. I thought…”

“Oh, his name’s Percy? Yeah, he was here before.” Merlin plucked the crust of his untouched sandwich.

The blond laughed again. “Yes, he’s Percy. The artist with the hammer is Gwaine. The black bloke Elyan, the one with the soulful eyes Lance. And Leon’s our architect, the one with the…”

“Blue prints and white hard hat, I guessed.” Merlin blushed again. 

“I’m Arthur, by the way.”

“Merlin.” He held out his hand which was taken in a tight grip by dirty callused fingers. “Nice to meet you.” In fact it was fantastic. Merlin had never dreamt of even talking to him, to Arthur. And now he sat there just across the table as if it was the most normal thing in the world to have a late lunch with your stalker. 

“So…Merlin, you’re interested in the process of erecting a building?” Arthur took a bite of his beef sandwich and washed it down with more water. 

Merlin grinned. This could have been so awkward, but Arthur seemed to be a good sport. “I’m more interested in the blokes who build it,” he admitted.

“Thought so. The lads said they missed you watching for two weeks.”

“They…they missed me? I was on vacation. I…” Merlin stammered.

“Sweet. Such a looker and so shy.” 

“Looker? Who? Me?” Okay, this was going in the wrong direction. Arthur was taking him on.

“Yeah, you. They told me about you when I joined them. Were all sad that you’d gone. And then happy when you showed up again. And I must say, they have good taste.” 

Merlin didn’t even know what to say to that. By stalking the construction guys, he had given them a show, too. Damn, this was embarrassing.

“Hey, don’t worry about that. I don’t mind meeting good-looking blokes this way.”

“You often do?”

Arthur laughed. “No, actually, this is the first time. But when someone shows so much interest, I thought I needed to meet him.”

“I’m making a total fool out of myself, aren’t I?” Merlin had plucked the crust of his sandwich apart and shoved the crumbs around on his tray.

“Only if you get all shy now and won’t take me home.”

Merlin lifted his eyes and was met with a serious look. “You…you mean that?”

Arthur nodded. “Damn, I couldn’t even come here to get us coffee. I would have jumped you during your lunch break.”

“That’s why only the others showed up?” Merlin’s brain tried to process what he just heard. Arthur wanted to jump him, that was…a smile spread on Merlin’s face…that was fantastic.

“Yeah.” Arthur crumpled the paper of his sandwich into a tight little ball and looked at Merlin expectantly.

“You want to…now?” He needed to make sure that his mind didn’t play tricks on him. 

“I wouldn’t mind.”

Fuck, this lad was straight forward, but Merlin noticed he didn’t mind. “Alright.” He got up and grabbed his Ipad. “Let’s go.”

It felt a bit odd to walk to the tube and ride the way back to Merlin’s place. He’d never done anything like that. Okay, he had picked up blokes at a club once or twice, but they usually had gone to the other’s place, not his own. But as he looked at Arthur’s scarcely clad body leaning close to the door of the car, Merlin couldn’t keep a grin off his face. Who cared what the people around them thought as they left the car at the same station and Arthur let him lead the way?

Merlin opened the door to his place and immediately regretted that he skipped cleaning last night in favor of having a good wank over the pics on his Ipad. Not even twenty hours ago, would he ever have imagined that this would happen. 

“So…,” he fiddled with his keys nervously after letting Arthur in.

The blond looked around and nodded appreciatively. “So…?”

“I mean…would you like a beer or something?”

Arthur nodded, but then reached out and pulled Merlin close, his fist in the front of Merlin’s t-shirt. Their lips met and Merlin sighed, keeping all still for a moment. But when he felt the tip of Arthur’s tongue against his upper lips, he threw his arms around Arthur’s neck and deepened the kiss.

He was utterly confused when Arthur pulled back with a grin. “Good start. But I’d appreciate if I could at least wash my hands.”

“Oh,” Merlin blinked a couple of times. “Of course. You could take a shower if you want to?”

“If you’re not into dirt smears on your sheets, I’d love to.”

Merlin showed him the way to the bathroom. “I’ll get you some towels.”

For a moment, he just stood in front of the bathroom door, unsure if he should just go in, but then decided he’d see Arthur naked in not too long anyway, so Merlin knocked and entered. “Towels!”

Arthur didn’t seem to hear him at first but then poked his head from behind the shower curtain. “Come on in.”

Merlin swallowed hard. 

“Hey, I’m all freshly showered and smelling good…what is this stuff? Grapefruit-mint? And you are in the same clothes than this morning.” Arthur grinned widely. “Get naked. Now.”

His eyes trained on Arthur’s wet shoulders, Merlin obeyed and wriggled out of his jeans and pulled his t-shirt over his head. 

“Wow.”

“What?” Merlin felt self-conscious. He never liked being looked at like this. Those piercing blue eyes wandered over his body and he almost covered himself with his hands.

“Nothing. You’re just…wow.” Arthur grabbed Merlin’s wrist and pulled him into the shower. 

Merlin decided that this wasn’t the place and time to discuss his sometimes wonky self-esteem and just wrapped his arms around Arthur’s neck and pressed against him for a kiss. 

Arthur got the hint right away and kissed him thoroughly, his hands running up and down Merlin’s sides before he pulled back. “Fuck…do you have something here?”

His mind was a bit fuzzy after this kiss. Nobody had ever kissed him like this. “Something?”

“Protection?”

“Oh.” Of course. He never had been with anyone without protection and he shouldn’t start now, especially with a complete stranger. “Sure.” Reluctantly, Merlin let go of Arthur and tried to reach the mirrored bathroom cabinet. 

Arthur chuckled. “As much as I enjoy the sight, don’t hurt yourself.”

Merlin shivered when Arthur ran a hand over his butt cheek, but he had to get out of the shower to reach what he was looking for. “Here we go!” 

Taking the things out of Merlin’s hand, Arthur pressed him against the tiles and kissed him again. “Gosh, you’re hot,” he murmured against Merlin’s skin as he kissed and nibbled at Merlin’s throat. 

His dick had reacted to the first kiss but now it was rock hard and rubbing against Arthur’s. Merlin wrapped his arms around Arthur and just held on. “Please…please…”

“Please what?” Arthur didn’t pull back but sucked on Merlin’s skin as he ran the pads of his thumbs over Merlin’s nipples, making them as hard as his dick. 

“Fuck me!” Merlin wasn’t always that vocal, but the whole situation made his head spin. He had taken a stranger – a hot construction worker – home for no other reason than to have sex with him. Wasn’t that every gay man’s fantasy? Maybe that was what it was, a fantasy, and Merlin would wake up in the morning finding that it had all just been in his head. When Arthur reached for his dick, though, it felt very real. 

“Love…love the sounds…the sounds you make,” Arthur whispered between kisses. His lips and teeth found one of Merlin’s nipples and played roughly with it.

Merlin made more sounds. He couldn’t help it. Instinctively, Arthur seemed to know where his sensitive spots were and didn’t even try being gentle on his nipples; it was a total turn-on. He tried to push up into Arthur’s fist. “Come on!”

Arthur pulled back and grinned. He was already breathing as hard as Merlin when he reached for Merlin’s hips and spun him around, pressing his front to the cooler tiles. 

Hearing Arthur fumble with the lube, Merlin braced himself against the tiles. He moaned when Arthur touched his arse and massaged around his hole for a while to make him relax. 

“Whoa, you’re tight,” Arthur whispered when he re-lubed the finger and finally entered Merlin with it. 

Trying to relax as much as he could, Merlin found it rather impossible. His body grabbed at the finger and held it tight. It had been a while since he’d last had sex and he wanted Arthur so badly. “Nevermind…” He panted and moved on Arthur’s finger. Soon, it wasn’t enough any longer. “More.”

“You sure?” Arthur whispered against his neck and licked at the droplets on Merlin’s shoulder.

Nodding quickly, Merlin made a whiny sound when Arthur withdrew his finger and soon returned with two. It was heaven and hell. Merlin wanted Arthur to take him, take him now, and at the same time, he loved how careful the other man was and that he took his time preparing him. Merlin’s cock stood out from his body, seeking friction that Merlin couldn’t give it. 

After Arthur had prepared him with three fingers, Merlin yelped when they withdrew, but couldn’t wait for Arthur to put the condom on. He yelled out when Arthur positioned himself and slowly shoved into him. 

“Fuck…fuck!”

Merlin would have given something to see Arthur’s face now. He wanted to know what Arthur looked like when he fucked, especially with the water from the shower running over him. He groaned at the mere thought.

Slowly, Arthur pulled out only to slam back in without pause. His grasp on Merlin’s hips would leave marks, but Merlin couldn’t care less. He panted and let his head hang low as he tried to move back against Arthur. 

Once in a while, Arthur whispered ‘fuck’ when he changed the angle or pace a bit but it didn’t take them long before he just fucked Merlin quickly. 

Merlin grunted each time Arthur slammed into him and pushed his face against the tiled wall. He wanted to reach for his own cock, but couldn’t. Slowly, he felt his orgasm build. “I…I’m….Arthur…” He threw his head back when his body tensed and he came with his cock untouched. 

It seemed that this was all Arthur needed, he stilled when Merlin tensed up and came hard. 

They stood like this for a while. Merlin didn’t want Arthur to pull out. Even though he went soft, it still felt wonderful to have him inside; and he felt a bit too wobbly to stand or even move the way it was. 

Slowly, Arthur finally pulled out. “Wow.”

Merlin didn’t know what that mean and what Arthur saw. He still leaned his face against the tiles and felt empty as the water ran over him. 

After a moment, Arthur leaned in and kissed his shoulder. “We should get washed up.”

When Merlin didn’t react right away, Arthur opened the bottle of shower gel and gently started washing Merlin’s back. Gasping, Merlin kept his eyes closed. His body was very sensitive at the moment and the minty shower gel he used at the moment made his skin tingle.

“You alright?”

Slowly pushing away from the wall, Merlin nodded. Nobody had done this after sex. He had fucked in the shower before, but nobody ever had so gently washed him afterwards. Even the calluses on Arthur’s hands felt wonderful. “You?”

“Never been better.”

Merlin finally turned and smiled. “Here,” he reached for the shower gel. “Let me.”

Washing each other so gently inevitably lead to some hand jobs and they both laughed at the fact that they had to wash themselves some more.

A while later, they’d managed to dry off and make their way over to the bedroom. They were spent and needed to rest, what better place than Merlin’s bed for that? 

Merlin thought he felt way too content when Arthur held out his arm and he snuggled close to him. He barely knew the bloke.

Merlin blinked when he woke up and then frowned when he saw Arthur at the foot of his bed, getting dressed. “What…?”

“Sorry, have an appointment later.” Arthur grabbed his tool-belt and hung it over his shoulder.

“Appointment…it’s Saturday night…” That could only mean…”Oh.” A date. Merlin slumped back against his pillow and was confused. Had he really thought that this was the beginning of a wonderful relationship? It was nothing more than a one-night stand. A one-afternoon stand, rather. He knew nothing about Arthur, how could he assume that he wanted more than just sex. Wonderful, sweaty, glorious, mind-blowing sex, but just sex nonetheless. 

“Yeah. I know it’s odd, but it couldn’t be scheduled differently.” Arthur grabbed his hard hat, came over and sat down on the edge of the bed. His eyes roamed over Merlin’s naked chest.

Merlin didn’t know what to say. He had wanted it as badly as Arthur but now he couldn’t help but feeling used. Somehow he had thought they’d spend the whole weekend together. 

Arthur leaned in and kissed Merlin softly. “See you on Monday.” He winked and left. 

Merlin tried not to think about what happened for the rest of the weekend. He changed the sheets as soon as he could make himself get up. If Arthur didn’t want this to be more than a one-nighter, he wouldn’t want to linger on it, either. And if he just buried his nose into the sheets before he stuffed them into the washer to get a last sniff of Arthur’s scent, so what? That he felt all wonderfully relaxed and tired and probably just a bit sore didn’t help. He couldn’t concentrate on anything all Sunday long and didn’t really know what to do once it was Monday morning. 

Should he take a different way to the office? Skip his routine of getting coffee and watching the construction crew? But that was childish. He was a big boy, he could live with this. And what was there to moan about anyway? Two adults, lots of great sex; that had been it. There hadn’t been any promises, so what had he expected?

When he pushed the door to his sandwich shop open, Derek behind the counter greeted him with a wide smile and turned in time to get the macchiato latte and put it on a tray where a salmon sandwich was already waiting. “Here you go.”

“But…errr…” Merlin frowned in confusion. 

“The blond gentleman from across the street says hi and…,” Derek pretended to think really hard, “enjoy your day and see you at lunch.”

Merlin blinked. 

“He’s been waiting for you, but you’re rather late today.” The barista shoved the tray into Merlin’s hands. “Enjoy.”

Looking at the tray a bit dumbfounded, Merlin didn’t know what to make of this. Arthur had bought him breakfast? He knew what he liked for breakfast? But that was probably mostly Derek’s doing. And Arthur had waited for him? But…if this had just been a one-time thing, …why?

Merlin found a seat away from the window and stared at the sandwich. Maybe this was Arthur’s way of saying ‘Sorry that I ran out’? 

Slowly, he sipped the coffee, casting shy glances through the window and across the street where the construction site was as busy as ever. When he finally decided it was okay to eat the sandwich – it was just a sandwich, right? – and lifted the box, he found a napkin underneath. Which was nothing surprising, but it had a number on it. 

Grinning, Merlin stuffed the box into his backpack, grabbed the coffee and the napkin and left the shop. As soon as he was out on the street, he typed the number into his mobile. 

“What took you so long today?”

Merlin chuckled. “Good morning to you, too.”

“Hey there.”

Arthur appeared on the second floor scaffolding, the mobile pressed to his ear. 

“Thanks for breakfast.” Merlin waved.

“You didn’t eat it.” Arthur grinned widely.

“Saving it for later. Speaking of which…”

“Lunch? 12:30?”

Merlin just gave Arthur a huge smile and a thumbs up before he ended the call, waved and then made his way to his office. 

They met for lunch and for dinner and Merlin had to go to work in the same clothes that he’d worn the day before, trying to ignore the looks and the whispers. Then again, he didn’t care. No matter where this would lead, Arthur was almost too good to be true, so Merlin would enjoy it as long as it lasted. 

_Hey sexy_

Merlin blushed when he saw the message.

 _Hi gorgeous_ He wasn’t used to this kind of flirting and almost giggled. It was fun!

_When will you be off?_

_4:30, if boss doesn’t plan otherwise_

_Damn. Have an appointment then._

_Come over later?_

Merlin frowned when he didn’t get an immediate answer, but then his mobile beeped again.

_How about dinner first?_

He could be home and cooking something for them if Arthur showed up late, but wasn’t it a bit too early to cook for him? They’d only just met.

_We can order something?_

_Nonsense, we’ll go out. Do you know Alfonso’s?_

Merlin swallowed hard. Alfonso’s was an Italian restaurant, as the name suggested, but one of the expensive ones. Probably not expensive-expensive, but it wasn’t a place Merlin could afford to eat at each week and Arthur was just a construction worker, he probably wouldn’t be able to afford it that easily either.

_Yes. Are you sure? We can go to a Leon of Bruxelles’ or that burger place around the corner?_

Biting his lower lip, Merlin wanted to slap himself. He had just hinted that Arthur didn’t have enough money to go to the place that was his idea. 

_Sure, I’m sure. See you there at 7:30?_

Sending a smiley and a thumbs-up, Merlin already made a plan to snatch the bill from underneath Arthur’s nose and pay for his dinner, too, or at least insist on splitting the amount. Then he made plans about what to wear. 

Reaching for his wine glass again, Merlin leaned back and smiled. It was late, way too late for still being out in the middle of the week, but he enjoyed every minute. Arthur had already been waiting for him and showed manners that seemed a bit too upper class for a construction worker. The moment he thought it, Merlin scolded himself. It wasn’t nice to push people in categories. He didn’t really know Arthur, who knew what he had done before he decided to build houses?

“What?” Arthur smiled at him.

“Hm?” Merlin couldn’t help but returning the smile. 

“You seem to be miles away.”

“Sorry.” Merlin put his glass down again. “I just thought how much I enjoy this evening. I haven’t had an evening out like this in quite a while. Thanks for suggesting this place.”

“I haven’t been here in a while either and I’m glad you’re having fun.” Arthur reached over the table and put his hand on Merlin’s. He smiled. “What would you like for desert?”

As Arthur was about to search the place with his eyes to find their waiter, Merlin shook his head. “Thanks, but I’m so full…” If he had been at the restaurants and pubs he usually went to, he would have rubbed his belly. 

Arthur’s face fell, obviously misinterpreting this for the sign that they should end the evening.

“How about a little walk?” Merlin didn’t want this evening to end. Arthur wasn’t only the best-looking man he’d ever been with and fucked like a porn star, he was nice to talk to and had a great sense of humour, too. 

Nodding, Arthur smiled. “I’d love to.”

Once again, Merlin noticed that the way Arthur phrased things and the words he used stood in stark contrast with the image Merlin had of a construction worker. Maybe Arthur had a secret? Merlin would do anything to find out. 

While he had been pondering this, Arthur had taken care of the bill. 

“I…I wanted to…”

Laughing, Arthur shook his head and put his credit card back into his wallet. “Don’t worry about that. Should we go?”

“We could at least have split the bill.” Merlin complained and got up.

“Merlin,” Arthur said when they were finally out on the street. “As I said, don’t worry about it. This isn’t a place I can go to every day, but tonight was special, so everything’s fine.” He grinned. “If it makes you feel better, you can buy me lunch tomorrow.”

Merlin looked at him with beating heart. Tonight was special. And Arthur wanted to see him again the next day. That meant he liked him, right? A huge smile spread on his face.

“I take that as a yes. So…where do you want to go for our walk? Should we go down to the Thames? South Bank probably?”

“I love to look at the reflections of the city lights in the river.” Merlin nodded.

“Romantic.” Arthur teased but as soon as they reached the South Bank, he took Merlin’s hand only to pull it back immediately when Merlin looked at him in surprise. “Too soon?”

Merlin shook his head. “I’ve wanted to do that as soon as we left the restaurant. Just wasn’t sure you wanted it.”

Arthur stopped and leaned against the balustrade, looking at the water and the sparkling lights on it. “I know. This all comes rather sudden, but…” He looked at his hand and then threw Merlin a crooked sideways grin. “It was only meant to be a one night stand, to be honest. I didn’t think I was ready for…but…” He shrugged and looked at the water again. “I like spending time with you.”

Leaning against the balustrade, too, but looking at the buildings, Merlin’s heart was beating wildly again. He knew he crushed on people way too quickly and he only knew Arthur for a few days, but it felt as if they had known each other for a lot longer, even though he still knew next to nothing about him. 

“I’m sorry.” Arthur sighed and pushed himself off the balustrade to stand upright again. “I shouldn’t…”

“No!” Merlin turned. “That’s not…it’s just…” He smiled, feeling the blush burn high on his cheeks. “I like spending time with you, too. It’s like this was only a little fantasy in the past week, but…you’re real and I’d like to get to know you…like properly…I mean, not only…like…tonight.”

Arthur threw his head back and laughed before he reached out and pulled Merlin close with one hand in his neck to kiss him deeply.

Merlin was still floating about a week later. They had spent every evening of the week together and had a wonderful weekend where they only left his bed when one of them needed to use the bathroom or the pizza was delivered. 

He couldn’t care less that his boss had been an even nastier arse than usual, nothing and nobody could spoil his good mood. 

_What do you want to do on the weekend?_

To the hoots and hollering of Arthur’s co-workers they had been kissing at the corner this morning and they had just acted even more wildly when Arthur flipped them off while still having his lips on Merlin’s. Merlin had felt his hard-on brushing against him when Arthur pulled back and put his hard-hat on before entering the construction area. As sexy as Arthur looked in his normal clothes or with nothing at all, when he was in his work-clothes he was a walking wet dream. 

_Sorry, can’t._

Merlin’s face fell. What was that? Did Arthur already have enough of him? They had been on cloud 9 for more than a week, what had he done or said that gave Arthur second thoughts?

_I will be away for the weekend. Family thing._

Maybe it was really just a family thing? Arthur hadn’t told him before, but he hadn’t spoken about his family at all. Or maybe he just needed a bit of time for himself or had promised friends to spend time with them and didn’t want to take him along? Which was totally understandable, it was too early to be introduced to their friends. They barely knew each other. 

_’k_

He couldn’t concentrate on his work, throwing the mobile he had put in plain sight looks all the time. Was his ‘k’ enough? Should he tell Arthur that it was okay? But if he sent a lengthy explanation now, Arthur would probably assume that it wasn’t okay and totally misunderstand it. So better leave it at that. And if they didn’t see each other on the weekend, he could finally clean his place properly again and do the laundry and all these grown-up things one had to do. 

The weekend dragged and Merlin was almost happy when he could go back to work on Monday, even though he wasn’t looking forward to yet another week with his boss, who did everything to make his day harder. Merlin didn’t know what he had done or said to deserve this, he was doing a good job. Maybe his boss just hated his mere existence and piled up more work on his desk than on any others’ and made him stay late for no real reason at all or made mean remarks whenever he could. If it weren’t so difficult to find a decent job these days, Merlin would have quit long ago. 

But Monday also meant that he could go to the sandwich shop again and see the construction workers and maybe get a glimpse of Arthur, whom he hadn’t heard from all weekend. More than once he was tempted to send him a text but then decided not to. They’d had a bit more than a week, that wasn’t enough to disturb Arthur in whatever he was doing when he had made it clear that he didn’t want Merlin to know. 

Adjusting his tie, Merlin grabbed his backpack and made his way to the tube. When he finally reached his destination, he was a lot more nervous than usual. What if Arthur wasn’t there? What if he told him the past week was a mistake and that he didn’t want to see him again?

The construction site looked deserted but when Merlin entered the sandwich shop, Arthur was already there, in the corner where they first met, waiting with his breakfast. 

He got up when Merlin approached and pressed a small kiss on Merlin’s cheek, who blushed immediately. 

“Good morning.”

“Hi. I already got your breakfast.” Arthur’s eyes were shining and he was smiling, but then the smile slid off his face. “What’s wrong?”

Merlin sat down and didn’t know what to make of it. Then he reached for the latte and decided to let it go. Arthur had been busy this weekend. It had probably been plans that were made ages ago, stuff like that happened. He plastered a smile on his face. “Nothing. Ready to face another week? Where is everybody, the place looked empty.”

“The guys are unloading a truck at the other end of the building. We needed more material which was delivered this morning.”

“And they spare you so you can have breakfast here?” Merlin teased.

“They have to do what I tell them. And if I tell them I’m going to have breakfast while they have to unload the truck, this is what they’ll do.”

Merlin blinked. “I didn’t know that the foreman could do that. Then again, what do I know about the construction business.”

Arthur laughed and shook his head. “It’s my fault that you are under the wrong impression, let me clear this up. I’m not the foreman, Lance is.”

His latte forgotten, Merlin looked at Arthur. “Then…shouldn’t you be unloading the truck with the others?”

Smiling, Arthur shook his head. “I own the company.”

“What?” It didn’t make sense. Arthur was here in dirty jeans and his tool belt, the hard-hat on the chair next to him. What kind of company could he own?

“Pendragon Constructions. That’s me.” Arthur beamed proudly. 

“You’re…the boss?”

Throwing his head back, Arthur laughed. “Is that so hard to believe?”

“But you’re…” Merlin gestured to Arthur’s attire. “And you are working over there, I’ve seen it.”

“Just because I’m the boss doesn’t mean I can’t help out on the construction site if needed. This way I know exactly how far we are in the project and don’t lose touch on what needs to be done on site.” 

Merlin was still a bit confused. “So you’re…going to the constructions sites to supervise?”

“No, to do the actual job. I’ve always liked working with my hands, building things, seeing the progress and making something that is not just numbers on a paper. So after university, I decided to open my own construction company. I knew that my people wouldn’t take me serious if I didn’t show them that I know what has to be done, so I started out being part of the team. That earned me the respect I needed to lead my own company at a rather young age. Now, I just like to jump right in when we need to finish a project and sometimes just to get a feeling for that particular construction site.” Arthur smiled.

“So…you’re the boss.” Merlin just stammered. He had just gotten a lot more information about Arthur than in the whole week before. Arthur had graduated from university and opened his own company right after that. He only worked on the site, well, actually because he liked it. 

Chuckling, Arthur nodded. “Yes. Is that a problem?”

Merlin caught himself and smiled. “Not at all. You just destroyed my picture of you as a construction worker, that’s all.”

“Don’t believe the cliché, my men are all highly skilled in their own special areas and they work together as a team perfectly. The times of the dumb construction guy who just whistles after good-looking women and can’t hold a conversation are long gone. Nowadays you have to know what you’re doing.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know you didn’t. So, when will I see you again? Tonight? Tomorrow? The weekend?”

A huge smile lit up Merlin’s face. “Yes.”

“What do you mean, yes?”

“All of the above.” Merlin grinned and got up. “I have to run. I can’t give my boss more reasons to hate me.” He pressed a quick kiss on Arthur’s lips, grabbed his backpack and left.

Merlin was insanely happy all day long. 

“Someone’s in a good mood.” Cara handed him a mug of tea and sipped on her own one as they had once again met in the little kitchen at the end of the corridor. She worked in the same office and Merlin considered her if not a friend, at least one of his co-workers that weren’t unbearable.

“Yup.” Merlin grinned at her. 

“Had a good weekend?” Her tone of voice became even more teasing.

Merlin against the counter and shook his head. “Nope.”

Cara blinked. “You had a bad weekend and yet you’re smiling like a loon?”

“The weekend was crap, but this morning started out great.” Merlin beamed widely.

“Do I even want to know the details?” She sipped her tea again, made a face and then turned to pour more milk into it.

“Well, you already figured that I met someone last week, right?”

“I understood that much, yes.” She grinned.

“And he wasn’t free this weekend.”

Frowning, she set the spoon aside. “Merlin…that doesn’t sound good. A bloke who only has time for you during the week?” She shook her head.

“He said it was a family thing, probably long planned, it can happen. You know how I’ll have to go to Uncle Gaius’ birthday next month? I can’t ask Arthur to come along, it’ll be too early, so…probably the same situation.”

Slowly, she nodded. “So, what does make you so happy today?”

Merlin noticed that he blushed. “He waited for me at the sandwich shop.”

“Aw, that’s sweet.”

“And hinted that we could spend this weekend together.”

“See,” she said, “Like I just said; he had plans that were made ages ago and since you’ve only known each other for a few days, he couldn’t take you along.”

Merlin chuckled. “What exactly do you mean that _you_ said that?”

She nudged him and laughed. “Come on, we’ve got work to do. Let’s go back.”

Merlin was a bit nervous. Arthur had been to his place before but usually they hadn’t seen much more than the bedroom. Now he was coming over for the weekend and Merlin didn’t know what else to do. He had been cleaning all day long and went for groceries, he had everything ready to cook. The only thing that was still missing was Arthur, who couldn’t manage to get out of an appointment with a new client. 

Rushing back to the window when he heard the noise, Merlin stared. A huge motorbike pulled up in front of the house he had rented the second floor apartment in. A figure all dressed in black turned the machine off and climbed off. When the person removed first the gloves and then the helmet to run a hand through his blond hair, a little surprised sound escaped Merlin’s throat. Arthur! The hot biker in black leather was Arthur! Merlin swallowed nervously and ran to the door when the doorbell rang.

“You never told me that you own a motorcycle!”

“Hi.” Arthur smiled and leaned in for a kiss. “You’ve never asked.” 

Merlin pulled him inside and all of a sudden felt shy. “No, I haven’t.” He looked around. “You already know my place.”

“Not really, to be honest.” Arthur placed his helmet on the floor carefully and started to pull the jacket off. The boots followed.

Holding his breath, Merlin wondered if Arthur would just pull the pants off here by the door. Arthur had different plans, though. 

“I’ll just…get changed in the bathroom, okay?”

Merlin nodded. “I’ll start dinner.”

“You’re wonderful. I’m starving!”

Using a dish towel as apron, Merlin stood by the pan and watched the veggies sizzle. He had been looking forward to this weekend ever since Arthur said he wanted to see him again. They had been here before, just two days ago in fact, but having Arthur here now, for dinner and conversation was almost more exciting than the fact that they would end this evening in his bedroom. It felt a lot more intimate.

“That smells great, what is it? Can I help?” Arthur showed up in jeans and a t-shirt, obviously having fiddled with his hair to remove the helmet-look, thereby having used a tad too much of Merlin’s hair spray – which was actually a former friend’s, long story – looking absolutely adorable. 

“If it turns out the way I hope, it’ll be chicken stripes and vegetables, served on pasta. I forgot the fancy name Jamie Oliver’s given it.”

Watching interestedly, Arthur grinned. “You watch his show?”

“Once in a while. I just wish I had the kitchen crew to buy everything and clean up after me, too, then I’d be done in 15 minutes, too.” Merlin laughed. “There’s some wine over there, do you want to open the bottle? There’s other stuff in the fridge, too. Feel at home.”

“Glasses?”

“Over there.” Merlin pointed and Arthur took two wine glasses out of the cabinet and another glass that he filled at the tap and drank down in one go. 

“Sorry, I was really thirsty.”

“You could have gotten a Coke or something from the fridge.”

Arthur shrugged. “I’m rather low maintenance when it comes to that. As much as I cherish a good wine, I’m happy with just tap water, too.” He reached for the bottle that Merlin had bought in the morning. “This looks good, though.” He opened it, waited a while and then poured them two glasses. 

Dinner was ready soon and Arthur complimented Merlin on the nicely set table, even though Merlin knew that his plates weren’t anything special and his cutlery had seen better days. He had put a lot of effort into the decoration, and yes, it looked nice. 

Merlin was relieved when the dish had turned out the way he intended and beamed when Arthur ate with a healthy appetite and asked for a second helping. 

After a while, he relaxed. It felt great having Arthur here. After his last relationship, he hadn’t liked other people in his place. Even his closest friends – of which he didn’t have many – couldn’t just show up on his doorstep, he preferred a fair warning. He had sworn to never share a place with anyone and after he’d had guests, he needed a while to make it his own again. It was different with Arthur. Merlin noticed he didn’t mind having him here, it was as if he belonged in the apartment. 

They talked about this and that, movies they liked, concerts they’d been to. Merlin tried not to talk too much about his job, it would only make him angry and get into a rant and that would drive Arthur away, he was sure. So he asked about the motorcycle and smiled politely when Arthur proudly rattled down all the technical data.

“And you have no idea what I’m talking about.” Arthur laughed.

“Sorry!?” Merlin made a face but grinned. 

“I just get way too excited about her.”

Sipping his wine, Merlin frowned. “Her?”

“The motorbike. I’ve only had it for two years, my ex never wanted me to own one.”

“Ex…” Merlin’s face fell while his eyebrows shot up towards his hairline.

Arthur smiled and reached across the table to put his hand on Merlin’s. “Yes, ex. It didn’t work out and now I can live the life I want to.” 

Of course, Arthur had a right to have a past, just like Merlin did. Merlin had just never wasted a thought on who Arthur might have spent it with and since Arthur had never mentioned anything before, he had just assumed that Arthur hadn’t been in any serious relationships before. 

“That’s…nice.”

Arthur chuckled. “Yes, it indeed is. It feels so…free.”

Merlin smiled carefully.

“To take that final step and admit to myself who I really am and what I really wanted? No, that wasn’t easy, but I’m glad I did it.”

Merlin looked up and he couldn’t help return Arthur’s smile. He had no idea what Arthur was really talking about, but getting out of a relationship that didn’t work felt liberating, he knew that. And Arthur was here with him now, that was all that counted. “Me too.”

Merlin braced himself on the bed as Arthur pushed into him from behind. It felt as if Arthur was about to fuck him through the mattress and Merlin’s head was spinning. It was just what he needed right now and Arthur had sensed it. He always seemed to know when Merlin liked it rough or when he was turned off by roughness and preferred it gentler. For now, there was nothing wrong with Arthur’s hands grabbing his hips and pulling him back towards him each time he slammed into Merlin. 

Then he felt Arthur move around a bit. 

“Come here.” He whispered.

Feeling Arthur’s hands wandering up his sides and pulling him back, Merlin understood. Arthur was on his knees now and wanted him to sit in his lap. Fuck, that change in pace made Merlin’s head spin even more. 

Arthur started to kiss his shoulder and nibbled on his neck, nosing into his hair while his fingers explored his chest and abdomen. 

“Arthur…” Merlin was close already, his dick stood out and had been leaking for a while now. Turning his head, Merlin tried to kiss Arthur. As he got the hint, Merlin’s hand came up and held on to the back of Arthur’s head. He had never felt Arthur as intensely as now, it was as if he reached in even deeper and it was heaven!

“Tell me what you want.” 

Merlin loved when Arthur was so breathless. It was a different breathless than when you worked out or came back from a run, it was a kind of breathless that only he could do to him. “Fuck me like this forever.”

Arthur managed a little chuckle and then bucked up into Merlin. “I wish I could.” His fingers slid deeper and he wrapped one of his hands around Merlin’s cock.

Yelling out, Merlin reached around and pressed his hand against Arthur’s buttock, trying to pull him even closer. With the rhythm Arthur’s hand set, he knew he wouldn’t last much longer. “Arthur,” he whispered and then tensed as he came. 

Groaning, Arthur bit his neck slightly, enough for him to feel it, not hard enough to leave marks. 

Very slowly, they both slid down and Merlin enjoyed the feeling of still having Arthur inside him. One day he would tell him about that little kink of his but he felt he didn’t even have to, it was as if Arthur just knew. 

 

Merlin panted and rolled to his side. It felt as if they hadn’t done anything but having sex all evening long and it was fantastic. 

“What?” Arthur was just as breathless as he was.

“What what?”

“What are you grinning at?”

Merlin lazily lifted his hand and stroked some sweaty strands of hair off of Arthur’s forehead. “Your hair.”

“Oy.” Arthur frowned and pulled back. “I know that my hairline isn’t what it used to be, but pointing it out after we had the best sex in forever is a bit…I don’t know.”

Scrambling around so he could look at Arthur properly, Merlin shook his head. “What are you talking about?”

“You said I’m losing my hair!”

Merlin blinked. He hadn’t said that but it seemed to be a sore spot for Arthur. “No, I said I’m grinning at your hair. The part where you put a bit too much hairspray in sticks out worse than my ears and that means something.” 

“Oh.” Arthur reached for that part on his head, felt that Merlin was right and huffed out a chuckle. “Sorry. And never say your ears stick out, they’re perfect.”

“They’re not, but thank you. At least they apparently make great handles when I give head.” Merlin laughed but then made a face.

“What? Has there really been someone who did that to you?”

Merlin still chuckled and then shrugged. It had happened. He didn’t like his head being held or ‘guided’ when he gave someone a blowjob and if he were honest, he had hated the blokes who had held on to his ears.

Arthur leaned over and kissed Merlin softly. “I’ll never do that, I promise.” 

“Was that a request?” Merlin’s eyes twinkled.

“Well…if you put it that way…” Arthur grinned widely.

Merlin groaned. “Already?”

Arthur chuckled. “No, not right now. Give me a break.” He moved close and wrapped his arms around Merlin. “I’m just saying I’m not averse to the idea.”

Merlin nudged Arthur’s side but put his head on Arthur’s shoulder. “So…what would you like for breakfast?” He asked when his stomach grumbled.

“You’re the hungry one.” Arthur chuckled. “And it’s 3 o’clock in the morning. A bit too early for breakfast, isn’t it?”

“Damn.” Merlin giggled. “Is this the point where I have to confess that I sometimes get so hungry that I have a late-night snack?”

“I think it is. Go, feed yourself before you starve.” 

Merlin stretched and wiggled a bit, but it felt so good to be close to Arthur and the way Arthur’s fingers were drawing lazy patterns on his skin wasn’t bad either. “I don’t want to get up, though.”

Sighing, Arthur untangled himself and sat up while Merlin watched him with wide eyes. 

“What…where are you going?”

Arthur got up. “Delivery service. But don’t get used to it.”

This wasn’t what Merlin had meant. He didn’t want to get up because it was so nice lying next to Arthur. Arthur making the trip to the kitchen to get him some food was incredibly sweet, though.

Arthur came back with a tray. “Didn’t know what you wanted.” 

He sat it down in the middle of the bed and Merlin started to laugh. There wasn’t only toast – untoasted – and some ham, there was cheese and marmalade, Nutella and honey, and even a spray can of cream. He lifted up the honey and then the cream and looked at Arthur.

“What?”

“Nothing.” Merlin grinned widely. “But I like the way you’re thinking.” 

They both ate a slice of toast with cheese and ham and washed it down with the water Arthur had brought, too. When Arthur wanted to set the tray aside, Merlin snatched the cream can. “I’ll still need that.”

Arthur set the tray aside and came back to bed, grinning widely. “Already looking forward to it.”

Later, Merlin pulled back, grinning widely, cream sliding down his chin. This had been the best and most fun blowjob he’d ever given. Arthur himself tasted great, but even better with cream. Merlin had chased the cream with the tip of his tongue and that alone made Arthur squirm and moan. Then he had sprayed a generous amount on Arthur’s cock and really went to work. Arthur made true of his promise to not hold on to his head and Merlin loved to see him fisting the sheets and making needy sounds. 

Arthur panted. “I’m all sticky.”

“That was the intention.” Merlin dropped down next to him, still licking his lips. 

Arthur groaned and reached over, pulled Merlin close and kissed him.

Before Arthur left on Monday morning, they tried to coordinate their plans for the following week and Merlin beamed when Arthur even suggested to trying to rearrange a few business things to be able to see him. 

“Don’t do that. It’s important.”

Arthur leaned in for a quick kiss. “So are you.”

“You’ve been working so hard for your company, don’t…”

“I won’t forget that. I just want to spend time with you.”

“Just come on over again on Saturday.” Merlin already made plans in his head of what to cook and which DVDs to get that they could pretend to watch while they were necking on the couch.

Arthur made a face as he picked his helmet up. “Sorry, can’t. Another family thing on the weekend.”

“The whole weekend?” Merlin didn’t like that at all. But even though it felt like he’d known Arthur forever, it was just a couple of weeks and long-made plans couldn’t be rearranged. 

“Yes, the whole weekend.” Arthur stepped close and put a hand in Merlin’s neck to pull him even closer. “Don’t give me that look. It’s just one weekend. I’m free the one following that. You know what? We can go to the pub and you can meet the guys, how does that sound?”

Merlin would have much rather spent time alone with Arthur, but he knew by now that Arthur’s ‘guys’ weren’t just mere employees, they were his friends and if Merlin wanted this to work, he couldn’t avoid meeting them forever. And wasn’t it a sign that Arthur wanted this to last, too, if he wanted him to get to know his friends? “Sure.”

“That doesn’t sound too enthusiastic.” Arthur smiled.

Merlin pressed a kiss on Arthur’s lips. “I’d love to meet your friends.”

“That’s a date, then.” 

“Looking forward to it.”

If Merlin had been a bit nervous when he entered the pub, he didn’t remember why a few hours later. Of course there had been some teasing about him sitting by the window watching the men work, but it all had been good-natured and now Merlin felt like they had known each other forever. 

It was great to see that those men weren’t only co-workers but friends and even couples. The way Gwaine had snogged Percy when Merlin came in left no doubt about that. 

“Hi, guys!” The architect stepped up to the table and they made room for him to sit down, too.

Merlin smiled. It felt as if their circle was complete now.

“And here is Merlin!” The tall man with the curly hair smiled. “I’m Leon.” 

Laughing, Merlin nodded. “Hi, Leon. Seems like everybody knows me already.”

“Well,” Leon chuckled, “we’ve been watching you long enough and in the past weeks, it was difficult to get Arthur to talk about anything else.”

Blushing slightly, Merlin laughed with them and bumped shoulders with Arthur.

“As soon as you get a girlfriend, you’ll get all that teasing back, you know that, don’t you?” Arthur mock-glared at Leon.

“And I’ll love it since I’ll finally have a girlfriend.” Leon chuckled again and took a swig of his beer. 

Elyan glared. “Just leave your fingers off of my sister!”

“But she could arrest me!” Leon wiggled his eyebrows and Elyan growled.

Everybody laughed and Merlin thought he just missed the joke, but that was alright.

“Elyan’s sister is a copper.” Arthur whispered. “She looks really good in her uniform.”

Sighing, Elyan kicked Arthur’s shin underneath the table. “Not you, too!”

Wrapping an arm around Merlin’s shoulder, Arthur shook his head. “You know that Gwen is lovely, but I have everything I need.” He pressed a kiss on Merlin’s temple.

Blushing once again, Merlin grinned when they all wolf-whistled and teased them again. He couldn’t help his stomach doing a funny little flip, though. 

“So,” Lance turned to Merlin, “when will we see you on the construction site?”

“I’m not sure if I’m allowed there. I know nothing about construction.”

“You will look great in a hard hat and a safety vest.” Gwaine nodded.

“So you only want me to model the hard hat for you? We can do that.” Merlin laughed.

After they agreed on a visit on the construction site, they went back to more private conversations.

 

When it was time to leave, they said their good-byes and Merlin loved how possessively Arthur once again wrapped his arm around his shoulder. He hadn’t had anything like that for so long that he’d almost forgotten what it felt like. They walked for a while until Merlin noticed that he didn’t even know where he was.

“Where are we going?”

“My place?”

“Oh.”

Arthur stopped and looked at Merlin. “I thought…we’re at your place all the time, it’s about time that you not only met my friends, but found out where I’m living, too.”

It wasn’t something Merlin had given much thought to. They just ended up at his apartment and if he wanted to cook, he liked to be in his own kitchen, it was his comfort zone. “Sure.”

“You don’t sound too excited.” Arthur tried to hold his gaze.

“That’s not it. It’s just…I didn’t bring anything along.” Merlin’s heart was beating a bit faster when he realized that Arthur hadn’t only introduced him officially to his friends tonight but that he would let him into his home, too. 

“You won’t need much.” Arthur winked. “And I got you a toothbrush and the toothpaste you like and your shower gel and such…” The smile started to slide off Arthur’s face. 

Merlin swallowed hard. That was a really sweet thing to do.

“We can go to your place, if you rather want that. Or…if I blew it now, I can take you home and then leave.”

When Arthur pulled back, Merlin followed and leaned in. “Your place it is.” He kissed Arthur softly. “Nobody ever did anything like that for me. Thank you.”

“What?”

“Planning like that and especially getting the stuff I like.” Merlin smiled. 

“Oh, don’t worry. No big deal.” Arthur had his arm around Merlin’s shoulder again and they started walking, Arthur steering Merlin in the right direction, Merlin following willingly.

Once in a while, Merlin threw him a sideways look and couldn’t help the smile on his face and the fuzzy feeling in his stomach. For the world, Arthur was a tough businessman, having his own construction company, making decisions that affected jobs every day but in moments like this, Merlin knew there was more to him, a softer side, a deeply caring one. This was the Arthur Merlin was about to fall in love with.

The moment they entered Arthur’s place, their clothes came off one by one. They didn’t even make it to the bedroom and Arthur bent him over the back of the couch. Merlin didn’t mind. He liked it when Arthur was a bit rough and he loved it just as much when they made love gently, like they did once the first urgency subsided after their first orgasms and they found their way upstairs. 

Merlin could kiss Arthur all night but as soon as they both had recovered, he had better ideas. 

Reaching for Arthur’s hands, he put them up over his head.

“What’s this all about?” Arthur smiled.

“Grab onto the headboard and don’t let go.”

“What?”

“You’ll see.” Merlin tried to look serious. “Or do I need to tie you to it?”

Arthur shook his head. “No need for that. I’ll behave, I promise.”

“Under no circumstances take your hands away from it, hear me?”

Now Arthur nodded and grabbed the headboard. He gasped when Merlin teased him into full hardness and lubed him up again. 

“Ready?” Merlin whispered. He had wanted to give Arthur a show of preparing himself, but he was still relaxed enough from when Arthur had taken him in the living room. 

Arthur’s eyes went wide when Merlin straddled him and reached for his cock to very slowly sink down on it. 

“Merlin…” Arthur was about to take his hands down but Merlin stopped him with one look.

“One wrong move and I’ll stop.” Of course he wouldn’t. This was way too exciting, but it was fun to be in control once in a while. 

Arthur still stared at him, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth and grabbed the headboard even harder. 

“Good boy.” Merlin grinned and started to move. He liked watching Arthur’s face. The way it first scrunched up, then his lips opened and he started to pant, sometimes he lifted his head, breathed ‘Merlin!’ only to throw it back into the pillows again when Merlin changed the angle or speed. Sometimes he lifted himself up to sit down again quickly and he loved how much he felt Arthur, he couldn’t take him in any deeper. Then he just gyrated his hips in little circles, so Arthur’s cock could touch him everywhere. After a while Merlin leaned back to have Arthur’s dick rub against his spot again and again. He supported himself with his hands on Arthur’s legs, so his own cock stood out proudly and leaked pre-cum all over Arthur’s belly. 

“Merlin!”

“Coming?” Merlin smiled as he stopped all movement and squeezed Arthur tightly with his muscles. 

Arthur yelled out. “If you keep that up…yes….”

Merlin relaxed immediately and that made Arthur groan. 

“I need to touch you. Your cock…I have to…”

Merlin had different plans. He wanted to come untouched, keeping Arthur on the edge for long enough to manage. He shook his head slightly. “No touching for now.”

“You’re evil.” Arthur groaned and let his head fall back into the pillows again. “And I love it.”

He almost chuckled as he started small movements again. He tried to draw it out even more, but Merlin knew he wanted to come just as badly.

“So…” Arthur was all breathless. “So beautiful.”

Usually, Merlin didn’t believe when people said this – not that he had heard it often before – but he had never heard Arthur say anything he hadn’t meant. So he moved a bit more, trying to make the muscles in his belly and chest tighten slightly, he hadn’t worked out for nothing. He stretched backwards a bit more, moving in little circles. Lifting up and sitting down wasn’t possible in this position anymore but the way Arthur’s cock was bent now and touched spots inside him was enough. He noticed little stars at the corner of his vision and knew he would come harder than ever. 

“Merlin!” Arthur yelled out when Merlin squeezed tightly around him and pulled him over the edge just as he was coating his belly with his load. 

Merlin’s arms started to tremble and he just managed to not fall backwards because Arthur had finally let go of the headboard and pulled him on top of him. He knew he was too heavy to lie on Arthur like this. Arthur tried to get his breath back, too, but Merlin couldn’t move. 

“Thank you.” He whispered against Arthur’s neck. For letting me do this, for trusting me enough , for letting me take control completely, he wanted to say, but was too busy just breathing. 

He felt that Arthur shook his head slightly. “No,” he breathed, “thank you.”

When he slid down in a chair, Merlin looked around. Waking up alone in Arthur’s big bed, Merlin had stretched and enjoyed the slightly sore feeling. When he heard noises from downstairs and Arthur didn’t come back, he slowly crawled out of bed and made his way to the bathroom to take a shower. He smiled widely when he not only found his shower gel and toothpaste, as Arthur had mentioned the night before, but also a few other things that were in his own bathroom, as well. Arthur had even gotten the same brand toothbrush. There was also a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt waiting for him. Both were a bit too wide, but that was okay. 

“Morning.” Arthur came over and put a huge glass of freshly pressed orange juice in front of him. 

“Mrng.” Tilting his head up, Merlin stretched a bit and was happy when Arthur got the hint and kissed him. “Thanks.”

“If that’s what I get for an orange juice, I’ll make some more often.” Arthur grinned.

Yawning, Merlin shook his head. “For that, too, but mainly for all the things in the bathroom.”

“Don’t worry about that. I couldn’t get your brand of muesli and only have this.” 

Arthur showed him a selection of colourful cereal boxes that made Merlin blink and look again. He never had thought that Arthur liked Fruit Loops and other such crap that pretended to be healthy but was actually not more than empty calories. Not that he was a health-food-freak and something delicious that only consisted of sugar once in a while was great, but Merlin just couldn’t picture Arthur spooning down a bowl of cereal for children every morning. Oh well, everybody had their own little quirks. 

“How about…”

“Scrambled eggs and toast?” Arthur looked hopeful.

“Sounds great. Can I help?” Merlin scratched at his chest.

Shaking his head, Arthur already put a pan on the stove. “Nope, just wake up, that’s enough help.” He chuckled. 

The night before, Merlin had no time to look around or even marvel in the fact that Arthur owned a whole house. When they’d talked about it at all, it had always sounded as if Arthur had a place similar to Merlin’s – small, old and cramped with stuff. This house was…from the outside it looked like a normal town house, surrounded by other houses that looked alike, but the inside was totally different. Everything looked spacey and brand new in light colours and lots of chrome with the occasional colourful spot, like the huge framed poster on the wall in the living room. 

“What?” Arthur took the toast out of the toaster and put the eggs on a plate and brought everything over. 

“Nothing.”

“It’s not like you thought it would be?” Getting a few more things from the fridge, Arthur finally sat down to have breakfast with Merlin.

Merlin shook his head, smiling. “Not really.”

“Hey, I work in construction, do you really think that my place doesn’t show it?”

“That you know how to put one brick on top of the other so the building doesn’t collapse doesn’t mean you know about interior design, as well.”

“In my trade, you get to know all kinds of people.” Arthur grinned. “And hey, I’m gay. Don’t you think I know all the best interior designers, hairdressers, make-up artists and flight attendants?” He gestured with his fork. 

Merlin laughed. “Yes, you are the walking cliché, of course you would know all the people. And here I am, knowing nobody and having a cramped place stuffed with things. How do you even keep up with me?”

Sighing dramatically, Arthur rolled his eyes. “I don’t even know.” He grew a bit more serious. “But I’m glad that I do. Now eat before your eggs get cold.”

Fiddling with the safety vest and the gloves Arthur had handed him, Merlin followed him onto the premises. He still wasn’t sure if he was even allowed on the construction site, there must be rules from insurances and such against people who weren’t connected to the building process but he had promised Arthur’s friends that he would come for a visit to admire what they had done so far. 

“Watch your step.” Arthur led the way. “And put the hard hat on.”

Merlin did as asked. It felt weird to have this thing on his head but at the same time, he felt like being able to blend in a bit more. 

“Merlin,” a familiar voice called, “catch!”

He turned and his eyes widened when he noticed that Gwaine was about to throw a tool over. Merlin knew he was the worst catcher in the history of catching things and for split second his mind wondered if that was even allowed.

Gwaine caught himself and tucked the tool onto his tool belt again as everyone laughed. “Good catch!”

Everyone laughed and they all greeted Merlin. Even Leon was there.

“Arthur? Can we talk about…”

Leon hadn’t even finished the sentence and Merlin watched in fascination how Arthur switched from tour guide to businessman, as Leon showed him something on his iPad and they seemed to go over a schedule or something.

“Let me show you around.” Lance took over and explained a few things to Merlin, but most of it he didn’t really understand since he’d never dealt with building anything. 

“What? Too much info?” Grinning, Lance threw Merlin a look.

Merlin shook his head. “No. Or maybe, yes. I never thought there was so much to think about when erecting a building. The only thing I’ve ever built were Lego things.”

Lance grinned. “It’s not only that, we also work with companies who come in after we are done. Sometimes one or two of them help us finish our part and sometimes we work along with them to finish the rest.”

“So you are kind of…allrounders?”

“Yes, we are.” Lance grinned at Merlin’s surprised face again. “Of course we can’t all be specialists, like…we know how to build walls that last a long time, we can’t all know what to do when you’re doing the electrics and we’re not allowed to, there’s rules and regulations. But every once in a while you catch on and the next time it’s easier to do what you can do because you know the steps or understood the logic behind it. Like Percy became really good at plastering and Gwaine is not only good with hitting his thumb with his hammer but also when it comes to knowing where power lines go through the buildings and in this case through the offices.”

“I never thought that building could be so interesting. And at the end of the day at least you see what you did and can go home and be proud of it.”

Percy came over. “It’s a bit of a strange feeling to walk past a building you know you’ve been working in when it’s done and other people go there every day for work or even live there.”

“Did you ever…” Merlin shrugged, “I don’t know, just walk up to the door and rang a bell and asked if you could take a look?”

Gwaine laughed from the other side of the room. “I haven’t, but that’s a great idea. We should do that once in a while, Percy.”

“What are you doing there?” Merlin went over and after a while all of them had explained what they are working on and let Merlin help. Of course he wasn’t allowed to do anything essential, he only carried bricks and buckets with things and held on here and there. 

“Alright,” Arthur came over. “Time for lunch break. Now you’ll find out what it feels like to have lunch at the construction site.”

Elyan showed up with huge paper bags from the sandwich shop across the street and started to hand out food and drinks.

Merlin laughed. “I get the full works today.” He lifted his hard hat and wiped the sweat off of his forehead. “Love it.”

They sat down and munched.

“What do you do for a living?” Elyan asked.

Merlin made a face. “Something that is a lot less satisfying than this here. I basically shove numbers around every day.”

“Paper pusher.” Gwaine grinned.

“Sort of.” Merlin nodded. “There are much more numbers on the screen, though.” He went into an explanation of what exactly he was doing, but noticed that they weren’t too interested, so he cut it short. “I’m kind of a book-keeper.” He shrugged.

“Nothing wrong with that.” Lance nodded before he bit into his sandwich again.

_Are you still suffering?_

Merlin looked at his phone and laughed. 

_Yes, I am._

Of course it wasn’t a big thing, but carrying the buckets around on the construction site a few days earlier had not only given him a sore back and arms, he had caught himself a stupid blister in his hand, too. It was a minor thing but Merlin was happy that he didn’t have to haul heavy stuff about every day. Sometimes he almost forgot about the blister, but then he reached for something or washed his hands and it made itself known again. So yes, he was still suffering!

 _Anything I can do about it?_ With a winkey smiley.

Merlin pondered for a moment. Arthur had already given him a backrub as compensation, even though Merlin suspected that he would have gotten one that night anyway. He needed it something to be that wasn’t too much and something they both could enjoy.

_How about you buy me something delicious at the Street Food Market on Sunday?_

That seemed to be a good idea. This way he’d not only get to taste some food he’d never had before, he also made a suggestion of what they could do on the weekend and showed that he wanted to spend it with Arthur.

The phone was silent for quite a while.

_Sorry, once again have plans for the weekend. Can’t go there. Too bad it’s this weekend._

Yes, too bad. Merlin’s face fell. They had admitted they liked each other, yes, but that still didn’t mean they had to spend every awake hour of the day with each other. Arthur was entitled to his own life, a life that he couldn’t or didn’t want to include Merlin in. Which was totally alright. Merlin knew it was much too soon, but he couldn’t help the sting. He wanted to include Arthur in everything he did and he wanted to be included, but Merlin knew he was usually pretty fast to let people into his life. They each had their own tempo. If Arthur needed longer, that was fine by him.

_I’ll find a similar event for the following weekend, alright? Will buy you all the food you want._

That made Merlin smile again. It was so Arthur to immediately think of something else he might like.

_Sure_

Just as he added a widely grinning smiley and hit ‘send’, his boss came around the corner.

“Emrys!”

“Mr. Ackers.” Merlin nodded. 

“We don’t approve of our employees being on their private phones all the time. It’s not what we pay you for. If I catch you playing with that thing once more, it’ll have consequences.”

Merlin took a deep breath to explain that he wasn’t on his phone all the time and that this was his coffee break. Everybody else was allowed to check their phones, some of the others were more on their phone than actually working and nobody ever got the evil eye. It was only him who the boss always snarled at. Merlin suspected it wouldn’t get any better when he actually said all that, so he closed his mouth again.

“Is that understood?”

“Yes, Sir.” Merlin glared after him as his boss walked on.

Gwaine bumped shoulders with Merlin as he sat down next to him with a fresh glass of beer. Of course Merlin knew the guys who worked for Arthur and had found out that they weren’t mere employees but close friends, as well. It was only the second time they were at the pub together and Merlin was still a bit nervous. If Arthur’s friends didn’t like him, this thing with Arthur might not work too well, his friends were important to him. Then again, they all had been very friendly from the beginning and already treated him as if he had been in their group for ages, especially since the day he had visited the construction site. 

“What’s up?” Merlin had liked him from the beginning and if you saw through all the rough act and the flirting, there was a good man who cared deeply for his friends. 

“Nothing much, just glad you’re here.”

Merlin smiled. “I was here before.”

“Not what I meant.” Gwaine took a swig of his drink. “I mean…you and Arthur.”

Throwing him a confused look, Merlin reached for his own beer. “What about him and me?”

“You’re good for him. He never brought anyone along before, he was all business all the time. Sometimes I thought he lived like a monk since his last break-up. You know he just came over to the sandwich shop because we threatened him with bodily harm if he didn’t. Never seen anyone pining like that since my teenage days.”

Merlin didn’t know what to make of that. Arthur, the big and strong, confident man he had met, needed a push from his friends to approach him? Then again, he would never have dared to do the same, so… “Why are you telling me this?”

“’cause I like you. No, not like that, even though…if I weren’t taken I might give it a try.” Gwaine grinned and winked at him. “It’s just…it’s good to see Arthur happy for the first time in his life.”

“You’ve known him for so long?”

“Long enough to tell. It’s a good sign that he brings you along when we meet. Maybe you’re the one who’s able to pull him away from what he calls his ‘duty’ a bit.”

“What do you mean?”

Gwaine looked over to where Arthur was talking about one of the construction sites with Leon instead of playing darts like they pretended to.

“He’s just dedicated to what he’s doing. It’s his company and there’s a lot of pressure and responsibility involved.”

“I know.” Gwaine smiled. “Sometimes he’s just a bit too involved and it seems as if he has the weight of the whole world on his shoulders. You seem to be a fun bloke with a good head on your shoulders, I’m sure you’re able to get him out of that for a bit, to make him see that there’s more to life.”

“Gwaine!” Percy came over. “Care for a game of pool?”

Getting up, Gwaine grinned. “I’d have a lot of other ideas how to put the pool table to good use.”

Blushing slightly, the big man laughed. “Unfortunately, none of them are appropriate in public, right?”

“Right.” Gwaine got up and followed Percy.

Merlin enjoyed the time he spent with Arthur to the fullest. The days were brighter and the nasty parts of his life were a bit easier to bear. When he stepped out of the tube and it had started raining and – as most of the time – he didn’t have an umbrella along, for example. Or when his boss decided to pick on him again. Merlin had never cared about working overtime just to show anyone that he was at the office. If a project had to be finished, though, he wasn’t one to drop the pen and go home. Even though there were a few of these things popping up – a co-worker messing up and him being left to pick up the pieces, some numbers only coming in last minute or the presentation of something important being pushed to an earlier date – Merlin never said a word and did his job. 

Sometimes he had to cancel their plans but most of the time he just worked a bit faster to get things done and still was able to meet Arthur. Sometimes Arthur was so wrapped up in his work that he had to postpone dates. It happened. 

Every other weekend, Arthur had plans that didn’t include him, but that was okay. Merlin liked having time for himself, too. When Arthur was around, things like cleaning the apartment and doing the laundry weren’t that important. So Merlin used his time without Arthur to do all that and all the things he had done in the time before Arthur. Usually, Arthur called when he was back and Merlin was insanely happy when they saw each other again. 

Arthur had great ideas to make up for lost time and Merlin, who had spent the bigger part of his spare time at home reading all these years, went to more shows, flea markets, festivals, on walks and to picnics than he ever had before. Of course those endeavors mostly ended at one of their places. 

To say that all of those great days ended with sex was exaggerated, some nights they just snuggled up in front of the TV and watched a movie and kissed and…oh, well, most of those great days ended with sex. The best sex Merlin had ever had. It was incredible how Arthur could read his body and how he was able to make Arthur yell out his name. One morning, as he was leaving for work, the elderly lady next door had just raised her eyebrow on him and Merlin felt like he was blushing all the way to the office.

_Gianni’s, 7:30_

Some days, when they hadn’t even spoken about a date, Arthur sent texts like this and they made Merlin smile. Of course, on other days, he was the one sending messages about movie tickets he had accidentally bought for the evening and that had to be used or a photo of the ingredients for a home-cooked meal. 

Merlin had never experienced anything like this. He had texted with people he’d dated before, but aside from little surprises, they let the other into their everyday life and that made Merlin smile each and every time. 

“Oh, someone seems to like the numbers of the new account very much,” Cara teased as she came to Merlin’s desk.

Chuckling, Merlin set his mobile aside. “Yes, they do make me smile.” 

The both giggled. 

“Don’t tell me you are sexting!” Cara mock-gasped.

“Nope,” Merlin blushed nevertheless, “it was just a photo of a nosy squirrel Arthur encountered at lunch break.”

“Squirrel, uh huh.” She wiggled her eyebrows and laughed. 

“Squirrel!” Merlin insisted but couldn’t help but blushing even more. 

“Want to go out for lunch and see if we can find a squirrel so you can send him a photo back?”

Merlin got up and pocketed his mobile. “I’m all for lunch. We’ll see about the part with the squirrel later.”

“Emrys!”

Cara rolled her eyes and Merlin tried not to sigh before he plastered a smile onto his face of which he hoped it didn’t look too fake as their boss approached his desk.

“Sir?”

“I’m not paying you for chatting!”

A remark about how Ackers didn’t pay him at all since he wasn’t the owner of the company was on the tip of Merlin’s tongue but he managed to hold it back. “Can I help you with something?”

Cara took a file off Merlin’s desk. “Thanks for your help with this, Merlin. I’ll be able to finish this a lot quicker now.” She nodded at their boss and walked back to her desk. 

Mr. Ackers looked after her for a moment and then turned back to Merlin. “What was that about?”

“We figured some things out about that account she’s working on. We’ve solved the issue now, the customer should be satisfied.” Merlin tried not to think of the fact that Cara took the folder in which he collected the menus of all the take-out places in the area or else he might have laughed out loud. 

“Don’t waste your time. If she’s not fit to do her job…”

“We’re a team.” Merlin wasn’t sure if he should laugh as he threw back into Ackers’ face what they heard at every team meeting or evaluation or if he should get angry.

Ackers threw him a long look. “Well, just do your own job.” Then he turned on his heel and walked off. 

As soon as he was out of sight, Cara came over again and rolled her eyes. “If he’s not on appointments somewhere else, he just sits in his office solving Sudoku puzzles but he can’t stand when two people just talk about something.” She groaned lowly. 

“He’s probably just annoyed that we don’t involve him in this serious matter.” A grin returned to Merlin’s face. “So…what do you think?”

Cara put the folder back onto Merlin’s desk. “Number 17 at the Golden Dragon to go?”

Getting up, Merlin reached for his jacket. “Sounds good to me. Let’s go.”

“It’s so nice here.” Merlin looked around the park as he played with the ends of Arthur’s hair. 

They had rented bikes and took a tour through the city in the early morning when the last party-goers were already back home but the tourists weren’t awake enough to do their sight-seeing. Merlin had never seen the city so empty and enjoyed that he could look at buildings and other things without fearing to get run over by a car any minute. 

When they’d had enough, they returned the bikes and had breakfast in a wonderful, small café at the side entrance of the park in which they sat now. Merlin had his back against a tree and Arthur’s head in his lap.

“Isn’t it?” Arthur murmured, his eyes closed.

“I can even forgive you for waking me up so early on a Sunday.” Merlin smiled. He hadn’t known of Arthur’s plans and reacted accordingly when Arthur had woken him at the break of dawn, excitedly telling him about the bike ride and the breakfast and the day in the park. At 5:30 in the morning, things like that didn’t sound very appealing to Merlin. 

Arthur chuckled. “Good to know.”

“It’s so peaceful here.”

“It usually gets more packed later. Families come in and people meet up to play ball and such.”

Merlin made a face. “Then it gets a lot louder.”

“Yup. So let’s enjoy this while it lasts.”

Leaning his head against the tree, too, Merlin closed his eyes and they sat in silence for a while, listening to the birds sing and the rustle of the leaves in the trees. Somewhere outside the park, a church bell chimed and sometimes an insect buzzed by. It almost reminded him of the little town he came from, the lazy Sundays as a kid and a time before he had come to London. 

“Are you a London native?” Merlin had never asked before. Arthur hadn’t told him much about his past. There were a few things he’d said in conversations about something else and a few that Merlin’s mind had made connections of, not knowing if they were right. 

“More or less.”

Merlin chuckled. “What does that mean?”

“If you mean if I was born and raised in downtown London…no. Nobody’s really born in downtown London unless your mother gives birth on the tube or a tourist does on Trafalgar Square.” Arthur smiled.

Poking him, Merlin chuckled. “There are people living there, too, and they must have children as well, so…”

They fell silent again and Merlin was okay with that. If Arthur didn’t want to tell him where he had grown up, it was perfectly alright. They hadn’t known each other for that long and Arthur probably came from a part of town that didn’t have the best reputation and he didn’t want to ruin things by revealing that. Merlin couldn’t care less if Arthur had grown up in a bad part of town or in Buckingham Palace, though.

“Camelot Heights.” Arthur said suddenly.

“Huh?” Merlin blinked.

“I grew up in Camelot Heights.”

Even though Camelot Heights was actually considered part of Greater London, it was far on the outskirts and didn’t like to be associated with the city and Merlin blinked. “Whoa. Posh.”

Arthur sighed. “Yes, posh area. But who said I wasn’t the illegitimate son of a housekeeper? Or the love child of a butler and a maid and just tolerated by their employers?”

Merlin made a sound. When people said ‘Camelot Heights’, one automatically assumed rich people, inherited money and snobbish attitude towards those who were less fortunate. Arthur was right, there were other people there, too. People who earned their money by cleaning after the rich kids. “So…where you?”

“What?”

“The love child of a butler and a maid?” Merlin smiled. Even as he said it, it sounded like something from a period drama. 

Arthur let out a deep breath and then shook his head. “No.”

That was interesting. So Arthur was born into money and yet he had a small construction company, lived far away from Camelot Heights and got his hands dirty working. 

As if Arthur had sensed Merlin’s train of thought, he sat up and looked at Merlin. “I wanted to make it on my own. Growing up, I’ve seen so much unfair behavior that I wanted to find out how it is on…well, on the other side. And I really like what I’m doing. Wouldn’t change a thing.”

Merlin looked at Arthur and didn’t know what to say. This was almost more information than Arthur had given him about himself in all the weeks they’ve been together. 

“So…are you?” Arthur smiled at him.

Raising his eyebrows, Merlin threw him a questioning look. “Am I what?”

“A native to London? By the way you start to use words I’ve never heard before when you’re slightly tipsy, sleepy or..,” Arthur wiggled his eyebrows, “very horny, I’d say you’re Scottish…or Welsh…or some other place that has words no normal tongue can pronounce.” He grinned.

“You take that back!” Merlin frowned.

“What? The unpronounceable words?”

“You know what I mean!” Merlin’s glare got stronger the more Arthur grinned.

“What? That you use them when you’re horny?”

“The ‘Scottish’! I am not, never have been and never will be Scottish!”

Arthur laughed, throwing his head back. 

“Not funny!” Merlin crossed his arms in front of his chest. 

“Very funny. So…am I right assuming that you are Welsh?”

A grin tugged at the corners of Merlin’s mouth. He had been brought up to be very proud of where he came from and still felt the need to defend his part of the country. In former times it had been considered a grave insult to be called Scottish. The rivalry still popped up in sporting events and every Welshman was quick to make everyone see that they were so much better than the Scottish, but Merlin only did it half-heartedly. He was proud of where he came from but in a globalized world all those rivalries just didn’t matter anymore, they all had to get along. He knew that the same counted for the Scottish. Some of his best friends at college had been Scottish. Of course, and with a twinkle in his eye, he needed to make Arthur see that Wales was a lot better than Scotland. 

“Yes, you are.”

Arthur leaned over and kissed the pout on Merlin’s lips. “You’re cute when you’re like this.”

Merlin pulled back. “Oh, twice in 10 minutes.”

“What? What did I do?” Arthur looked confused.

“You manage to insult me twice within 10 minutes! First, you’re calling me Scottish and now I’m ‘cute’.” Even though he tried to make this sound angry, Merlin had to laugh.

Arthur sighed deeply and hung his head. “Okay, I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

“Calling you Scottish.”

“And?”

“And nothing, you might not be Scottish, but you’re still cute when you’re pouting.” Arthur leaned in for another kiss. 

“You know,” Merlin smiled when they broke the kiss, “We could go to Wales next weekend and I’ll show you how beautiful it is where I grew up.”

The smile slid off Arthur’s face. “In two weeks on the weekend?”

“No, next weekend. They have their annual carnival there and there will be freshly made specialties to try at every corner.” Merlin smiled widely. He hadn’t been to his home town in ages and the prospect of showing it to Arthur got him excited. 

“Merlin…”

“We can even go up to the coast, it’s so beautiful there and not too crowded at this time of year. We can go for a walk on the beach or just sit there and watch the waves rolling in and there’s flea markets in lots of towns along the coast and…”

“Merlin.”

“What?”

Arthur sighed. “I can’t spend next weekend with you. I’ve got plans.”

Merlin’s face fell. “Oh…right. Every other weekend.” He looked away.

“You know that.”

“Will you ever tell me what you’re doing every other weekend?” Merlin bit his lower lip. He didn’t want to sound needy or clingy. It was just weird that Arthur didn’t even have five minutes to spend with him every other weekend. 

Arthur nodded. “One day, I will tell you. But for now, I can’t. I’m sorry.”

Merlin didn’t say anything. It was alright. Well, it was probably weird. Arthur had let him into his life so much lately, why didn’t he want to tell him what he was doing on the weekends they were apart?

“Hey,” Arthur said softly, cupped Merlin’s face with his hand and turned it towards him. “I promise I will tell you soon. You will understand my reasons for not telling you sooner, then. Please trust me for now.”

Merlin didn’t know what to say. He trusted Arthur, he wanted to trust him. It was still strange that he first let him in only to shut him out like that for two days every fortnight. 

“Do you? Do you trust me?”

Looking into Arthur big blue eyes, all Merlin could do was nod. He couldn’t help but feel a little bit jealous of what- or whoever Arthur was spending his time with but the look in Arthur’s eyes seemed to be so honest that Merlin leaned in to kiss him.

When they broke the kiss, Arthur smiled at him. “Want to go and get an iced tea and some carrot cake?”

Merlin nodded.

Merlin wandered along the street and looked at the shop windows without seeing anything. It was another Saturday where he was alone. Before, he had always found something to do but since he’d met Arthur, he felt restless when they weren’t together. Then again, what were they? They’d never spoken about it. They met often and it wasn’t always for sex. They went places and had nice dinners or…or well, just shagged. No, that wasn’t true. There was more to it, even though none of them had talked about it more than saying they liked each other. Merlin felt weird when he had time on his hands and Arthur wasn’t available. If he were honest it bugged him that Arthur never wanted to see him on Saturday nights; or at least every other Saturday night, every other weekend, there seemed to be a pattern to it. 

Just when Merlin was this close to falling in love when they were together all night and had a cozy Sunday and made excited plans for the next weekend, Arthur told him he had an appointment that would take a while or a family thing that lasted all weekend. Why was it that he didn’t want him around? Why were there always appointments that made them not spend all the time they could together? In the beginning, Merlin had thought that Arthur saw clients that just couldn’t fit the appointment in during the week but nobody saw clients on the weekend every two weeks. The company was fine, things were going great; Arthur didn’t have to do that. So…what was he doing?

Merlin looked at the shop window of a large toy store, blew out a deep breath and turned to wander on aimlessly. He had thought about just going to Arthur’s place and ring the doorbell to demand an explanation. If he did that, though, he might blow his chances and their time together would stop which Merlin didn’t want either. Ever since they’d met, Merlin had felt a lot more alive than ever before. 

He was just about to decide to go home, get some take-out on the way and leave it at that - it wasn’t as if they were together, even though they kind of were but neither of them had said the b-word yet or even the l-word, so Arthur didn’t have to give him any explanation of what he did – when a little girl, not older than six or seven bumped into him. She stepped back and looked up at him with wide horrified eyes.

“Are you alright, little one?” Merlin tried to find out if she had hurt herself running into his leg while she looked at him with eyes that seemed to be so familiar. 

“Feli! Feli come here! I’ve told you not to run onto the pavement, at least apologize to the gentlema…”

The voice was even more familiar and Merlin’s breath caught when he saw Arthur squat down next to the girl to talk to her and then look up and stop mid-word.

The dark-haired girl looked from Arthur to Merlin. “Sorry, Mister.”

“What are you doing here?”

Merlin blinked at Arthur’s almost hostile tone of voice. “I went for a walk and looked at the shops. If that’s forbidden now, I didn’t get the memo.”

“Daddy?”

Daddy? Merlin blinked again. The girl had called Arthur ‘daddy’. Arthur led the life of a single gay man, how could he be a father? Merlin stood and tried to process the information and all of a sudden, it made sense. The girl’s eyes were Arthur’s, she actually looked exactly like Arthur. Like Arthur with dark, long hair. 

Arthur pressed a kiss on the girl’s hair, took her hand and got up. 

An awkward little silence spread. 

“Daddy, who is this?” The girl pressed herself against his leg. 

Arthur’s face became soft. “That’s my friend Merlin.”

Merlin almost sighed. At least Arthur hadn’t told her that he was ‘someone he knew’ or just ‘a friend’. 

“A friend from work?”

Looking at Arthur for a moment, Merlin squatted down. “Hi, I’m Merlin.”

“I’m Feli.” She looked at him skeptically for a moment and then giggled. “Your ears are funny.”

“Feli!” 

Merlin laughed with her. “They are, aren’t they?” Then he got up again. “Listen, Arthur, I’m…I’m sorry. I think I understand now. I don’t want to intrude.” He worried his lower lip with his teeth. 

“Can we talk about this some other time?” Arthur held the hand of his daughter a bit tighter. “We have plans.”

“Sure. Sorry.” Merlin, who didn’t really feel like smiling, smiled at Feli anyway. “Have fun, Feli.” He winked at her and waved. 

She waved back. “Daddy? Can Merlin come?”

“I’m not sure if Merlin has time to come with us, honey.”

“I don’t want to intrude.” Merlin repeated and smiled apologetically at Arthur. “It’s your time with daddy, I don’t want to take that away from you.” He had no idea where they were heading anyway. 

“But there will be ice cream.” The girl tilted her head and looked at Merlin endearingly. “Please?”

Merlin exchanged a look with Arthur. 

“Please? Daddy?”

Oh, she was only little, but she had the big puppy-eyes act down pat. 

“If Merlin wants to…” There was a small smile on Arthur’s face. 

“I don’t really have other plans…but only if it’s really okay.”

Arthur nodded and Feli squealed. 

“To the ice cream place!”

Hours later, Arthur poured them a glass of wine while Merlin sat on his couch like he had done before. They had gone to the ice cream parlor and Feli had alternated between throwing Merlin shy looks and telling him things. When he had helped her colouring in the placemat she had gotten from the nice waitress and promised to go to the kids’ play corner after they’d had their ice cream, she seemed to be convinced and treated him like they had known each other for years. Now she was upstairs in her bed and sleeping tightly after Merlin had read her a bedtime story. 

“I should be jealous.” Arthur handed Merlin a glass before he poured himself one, too. 

“Jealous?” Merlin smiled.

Sitting down, Arthur looked at Merlin. “This is the first time she has let someone else read her a story. She doesn’t like it when my sister tries and she took the book from Percy when he was over, telling him he didn’t do it right and she would read him the story instead.”

Merlin chuckled at that. He could picture the scene so well. “She’s precious.”

“She is.” Arthur smiled a little sadly.

“Listen, Arthur, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do this. I didn’t even know that you would be in the area.”

“I know.” Arthur put his hand on Merlin’s to keep him from apologizing. “I was a bit shocked to run into you, I admit. It’s difficult.”

Merlin just nodded. 

“Her mother and I…it just didn’t work, so we got a divorce – you probably guessed that - when Feli was four. It was a long, hard fight to have her over every other weekend and that’s why…I’m sorry, Merlin, as long as we’re just…”

Looking into his glass, Merlin didn’t really know what to say. “I thought…that you were into men.”

“I am.” Arthur chuckled. “That’s why it didn’t work out between Mithy and me.”

“Why did you get married, then?” Merlin looked up. “Sorry, you don’t have to tell me.”

Taking a sip of his wine, Arthur set the glass down and then looked at Merlin. “It was expected of me. I got married because my family expected me to.”

“And here I thought arranged marriages were a thing of the past.”

“It wasn’t that I didn’t like her. Mithy is great. She was even very understanding when I came out to her. It’s just not something you can base a relationship on.”

Merlin nodded. This was the strangest thing he’d ever experienced; it all sounded like some made-up plot from a soap opera. 

“Then we got the divorce.”

“If she’s so understanding…why did you have to fight so hard for the right to have Feli over?”

“She had stupid lawyers, who told her that it was the right thing to do and the wrong friends who made her believe that gay men just fuck everything in sight and neglect all other things for that.” Arthur sighed. “We’ve established a good…I almost tend to say friendship at this point in time. I just can’t ruin this, I can’t lose Feli.”

“She’s something.” Merlin smiled and then the smile fell off his face. “I hope I didn’t ruin anything now. I mean…she might tell her mother when she goes back? What will she think?”

Arthur didn’t say anything for a moment. “You’re the only one she’s ever met, not that there have been many. Maybe that’s good, Mithy never believed I lived like a monk anyway. It’s just…Feli immediately took to you, she likes you.”

“I like her, too.”

“I just…how do I explain to her if you decide not to see me anymore, you know?” 

Arthur looked at him and Merlin had never seen him so vulnerable. 

“Why would I not want to see you anymore?”

“Because…I’m a single father. In a few weeks Feli will stay with me for a while since Mithy has to go on an extended business trip. And even if she’s not around, it’s what I am. A father. You might not want someone with that responsibility.”

Merlin looked at Arthur for a long time and then took a deep breath. “I have to admit, I don’t really know what it means to be a father but she’s such a charming kid.”

Arthur smiled. “You have seen her from her good side. Wait until the little devil inside her takes over.”

“I’ll deal with it then. I just…thanks for telling me all that. It drove me nuts not to know what you were up to when you didn’t have time.”

“It did?”

“What?”

“Drive you nuts?”

“Of course it did, doofus. One weekend we have heaven on earth, the next I’m sidelined without even knowing why. I sat about making plans for the future only to think that you’d much rather see someone else.”

“Well…”

“Someone male-else.” Merlin couldn’t help but chuckle. He was so relieved.

“Male-else.” Arthur threw him a mock-frown.

“Male-else, it’s a word, I’ve just used it. Anyways…to make a long story short…I’m not going to run just because there’s this wonderful little girl.” Merlin took another deep breath. “I really like you, Arthur, and I want this to work.”

Arthur looked at him and a huge smile spread on his face. His head fell back and he laughed. 

“What’s so funny?” Merlin threw him an irritated look. 

“I’m just so relieved. You know, after the ordeal of the divorce and trying to find my feet all alone, juggling the company and the legal stuff, keeping Feli happy in the process…I kind of neglected myself a bit. And all of a sudden there was you.” He shrugged as if that explained everything. 

“You make that sound like it was a bad thing.”

Shaking his head, Arthur smiled. “Not at all. It felt like being able to finally breathe again.”

Merlin had found out by now that Arthur wasn’t the over-confident cocky construction worker he had met. Very often Arthur just covered his insecurities with his know-it-all-act. And yet, he had never been so open and honest with him. Merlin held his breath.

“I thought we’re quite good together and hoped…yes, I want this to work, too.”

Feeling a smile on his face so huge that the corners of his mouth seemed to touch his ears, Merlin set down his glass on the coffee table and turned to kiss Arthur deeply. 

“Merlin! MerlinMerlinMerlinMerlin!” 

Merlin laughed. “I’m here, I’m here!” He caught Feli who was running towards him full speed and let himself be kissed on the cheek. “How are you, sweetheart? Ready for our trip to the zoo?”

Arthur dropped her little pink duffle bag and her backpack with some cartoon character on it next to the stairs. “Oh swell. I am obviously demoted to luggage-hauler. Not important anymore.” He sighed dramatically.

Feli turned and wiggled, so Merlin set her down again. “I love you, too, Daddy!” She ran and hugged him, too. “When are we going to the zoo? Will there be ice cream?”

Shaking his head in amusement, Arthur took his jacket off. “It’s Friday night, princess. We are going to the zoo tomorrow and maybe…just maybe, there will be ice cream.” He winked at her. “Now go, wash up. We need your help preparing dinner.”

She squealed and ran upstairs. 

Merlin stepped up to Arthur as he was looking after her. 

Wrapping his arms around Merlin, Arthur kissed him. “Thanks.”

“What for?” Merlin leaned against him. 

“I wasn’t sure what you’d do if you found out that she’s such a big part of my life. But now…it looks as if she loves you more than me.”

“That’s just the fascination with the new.” Merlin smiled. “You’re not really jealous, are you?”

Arthur threw him a look. “No.”

“Oh my God, you are! Just when I think you can’t get any cuter.” Merlin pressed a wet smooch on Arthur’s cheek.

“I am NOT cute! Handsome, good-looking, sexy, a good businessman, yes, but NOT cute!” Arthur mock-frowned.

Merlin leaned in and licked at Arthur’s earlobe. “And so hot when you’re pouting. Gosh, I want you, right now.”

“Daddy?” Feli came running down the stairs rather noisily. 

Arthur closed his eyes and stifled a groan. “Yes, dear?”

“I’m done. Can we have dinner now?”

Merlin laughed and let go of Arthur. “We need to cook it first and we need you to help.”

“But my apron is at Mommie’s!”

“Come on, we’ll find something for you and later you can help Arthur to set the table.”

Feli ran towards the kitchen and Merlin wanted to follow but Arthur grabbed his wrist and held him back. He leaned in and kissed him deeply. 

“What was that for?” Merlin blinked and was a bit out of breath.

“Just because.”

Merlin frowned when he saw Arthur coming down the stairs in his leather gear. In the beginning he had thought Arthur looked hot in all this black leather but now he had an uneasy feeling when Arthur was out on the road on his bike. 

“It looks as if it’s about to rain, are you sure you don’t want to take the car?”

Arthur leaned in and pressed a kiss on Merlin’s temple. “There were times when this outfit made you so frisky that you couldn’t peel me out of it quickly enough. What happened?”

“It’s just dangerous. And with Feli being here…maybe you should take the car.”

“I appreciate your concern, but you worry too much.” Arthur beamed. “You know I’m a safe driver, no matter what the vehicle is.”

“Merlin!” Feli ran down the stairs. “We forgot the picture I drew for Trish!”

Merlin threw Arthur a look and then went looking for the drawing with Feli. Her friend was back from having her appendix being taken out and Feli hadn’t talked about anything else in the past two days. He wasn’t happy that Arthur liked his bike so much and didn’t really understand why it meant so much to him. Arthur was such a responsible person, why did he insist on having such an irresponsible hobby? Maybe that was just the point. That didn’t mean that Merlin had to be happy about it, right?

Arthur took his helmet. “Merlin is going to take you to school, Feli. Keep an eye on him, I don’t want him to cause trouble.” He winked at her.

Feli giggled and nodded. “I’ll take care of him.”

Merlin laughed as Arthur first kissed Feli and then him and left. 

“He’s gone.” Merlin said conspiratorially. “What are we going to do now?”

Sighing as dramatically as only a seven-year-old could, Feli rolled her eyes. “I have to go to school and you have to go to work.”

“Do we really have to?” Merlin had taken Feli to school a couple of times since she stayed with Arthur and it was their little game that they switched roles and she insisted they’d go to school and work and he tried to wiggle out of it. 

“Yes, Merlin.” Feli put her jacket on and looked at herself in the mirror, straightening her blouse a bit. “Let’s go.”

Smiling, Merlin took his things, followed Feli outside, locked the door and they walked to her school, talking about the upcoming summer holidays and her birthday that wasn’t too far away either. 

“Feli might not like this.” Merlin smiled.

Arthur took his hand and dragged him over to the next food stand. “She’s at her friend’s for the night, she will be all hyped up and happy when she comes back tomorrow.”

“But she wanted to come to the food festival, too.”

“We were here last year. She wanted to try everything and it cost me a fortune and very often she only took one bite, decided she didn’t like it and immediately wanted something else. My stomach felt off for a few days since she left me to eat what she left over and it was way too much.” Arthur grinned. 

“I solemnly swear to eat everything I want to get.”

Arthur laughed. “Maybe we can share, but I’m not going to eat all the left-overs.”

Merlin shook his head and dragged Arthur over to where he saw fruit he hadn’t seen before. “Maybe we could try this?”

A few hours later they sat near the Thames and Merlin dangled his feet. 

“Thank you for this day, Arthur.”

Arthur threw him a look. “I enjoyed it, too.”

They sat in silence for a while, just watching people passing by and enjoying each other’s company. 

“You know, I was rather anxious about Feli being here.”

“Why?” Merlin didn’t turn to look at him, he was busy watching one of the street artists going through his act. “She’s been with you for longer times before.”

Shaking his head, Arthur reached for Merlin’s hand. “I didn’t know if we would all work out together. She’s such a big part of my life and you are, too, so I was a bit afraid of what would happen if you two didn’t get along if you had to spend so much time together.” He smiled carefully. “I needn’t have worried.”

“She’s a great little girl, what’s not to love?” If Merlin were honest, he had been a bit afraid of that, too. He liked Feli and she liked him, too, but spending so much time together had been a risk. What if she minded that he was a part of her father’s life now and around most evenings and a lot of times in the morning, too? Feli had thrown one or the other temper tantrum about small things – not finding the second one of her pink sandals or not being allowed to finish watching a TV show after her bed-time – but she had never said anything that made him feel like not being welcome. 

“You took over a lot of the responsibility, that’s not a given. You could easily leave all the complicated stuff to me and stand in the background, watching, until she is in a good mood again and then play the fair-weather-uncle, if you know what I mean. You didn’t and I’m really grateful for that.”

“As I said before,” Merlin sat his empty ice container to the side, “I want this thing between us to work. And if it means to take over a bit of the responsibility, that’s fine by me. Feli’s not a chore. She has her bad moments, but don’t we all? She’s wonderful.”

Arthur just looked at Merlin. “I love you.” 

A huge smile spread on Merlin’s face. “Love you, too.”

“Merlin!”

For the umpteenth time, Feli yelled for Merlin. She was staying with Arthur now and of course that took away from the time Merlin could spend alone with Arthur. He found he didn’t mind, though. Feli had her phases where she could be pouty and stubborn, but most of the time she was a cheery and happy kid. 

“What is it?” Merlin didn’t even move from the chair he sat in to enjoy some of the few rays of sun in the small backyard of the house. They had spent the day in the park, playing ball with Feli and hide and seek and been chasing her around or having her chase them. While he was exhausted, Feli seemed to have endless reserves of energy.

Feli appeared next to his chair. “Nothing.” She beamed. “I just wanted to make sure you’re still here.” 

Chuckling as she ran off again, Merlin shook his head. He wouldn’t leave without telling her and since Arthur had a lot of work to do, he’d spent more time at Arthur’s house than ever before. Feli and he were a good team. 

For a moment, he allowed himself to picture a life like this. He’d never thought he would be a father. From very early on, he knew he liked men but having children had never come up. His earlier relationships hadn’t lasted long enough for the urge to even arise. 

Now, he had just simply fallen in love with a man who happened to be a father. Merlin shrugged mentally. So what? It was who Arthur was and it wasn’t really a hardship to deal with his daughter either. Of course it changed a few things. He had to be a bit more careful what he said and how he phrased it. When he ranted about his job for example, he needed to make sure Feli was nowhere near or else she would have heard all the names he had for his boss and he didn’t want her mother to believe that Arthur was with someone who taught her foul language. And of course they couldn’t run about the house naked anymore and have sex over every piece of furniture while Feli was here. They still had enough activity in the bedroom, so Merlin didn’t complain. 

Arthur set a big glass of iced tea on the table next to Merlin. “Here you go.” He leaned in to get his thank-you-kiss.

“Thanks, love.” Merlin yawned.

“Am I that boring?” Arthur sat down in the other small chair and smiled at Merlin.

Shaking his head, Merlin reached for the glass and took a sip. “Not at all. Sitting here in the sun just makes me sleepy after all that running around today.” He stretched before he settled in again.

Arthur chuckled. “Like a big old cat.”

Opening one eye, Merlin looked at Arthur. “Whom are you calling old here?”

“I’ll make it up with skritches later, okay?” Arthur grinned widely.

Merlin nodded and closed the eye again. “Sounds good to me.”

Life was good. 

Merlin scribbled some correction on the sheet of paper in front of him when the phone rang. Absentmindedly, he reached for it. “Emrys.”

“Mr. Emrys? Teddington Police Station, I’m Constable Smith,” a female voice Merlin didn’t know said. “I understand that you are Mr. Pendragon’s point of contact?”

Merlin felt the colour draining his face and a cold fist clutch his heart. “Yes, I am. What’s with him? What is wrong?”

“There has been an accident.”

Merlin didn’t really hear what the Constable told him. Arthur…Arthur had been in an accident. 

“Sir? Are you still there?”

“Yes, sorry, what happened?” Merlin felt himself close panicking. 

“Mr. Pendragon is being taken to the hospital as we speak. We need you to come in and pick up his things, though.”

Merlin nodded before he realized that she wouldn’t see that. “Yes…I…I’ll come right away.”

On the way to the police station – what the hell had Arthur been doing in Teddington? – a thousand thoughts ran through Merlin’s mind and he couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down his face. The motorbike. That damned motorbike that Arthur loved so much, it was all the bike’s fault! Why hadn’t he taken the car to his appointment today? And why had he, Merlin, not held him back and asked him to take the car? It was his fault. It was his fault that something horrible had happened to Arthur! What if…no, he couldn’t allow that thought! 

He almost had an accident himself because he didn’t really see through all the tears. Pulling into a parking spot in front of the police station, Merlin blew his nose and wiped his eyes. They were red and swollen, but he couldn’t go into the station a sobbing mess. Trying to calm down, he took the few steps and entered. 

“I’m looking for Constable Smith,” he told the dark-skinned policewoman at the front desk. 

“That’s me.” She smiled at him. “What can I do for you?”

“I’m Merlin Emrys.”

 

Merlin didn’t know how he made his way to the hospital and how much time had passed. The Constable had explained to him several times how the accident had happened; that a car took a wrong turn and didn’t see Arthur on his bike and that Arthur had crashed into the car’s side with no chance of avoiding the accident. He had been thrown across the car’s roof and into a nearby park. Merlin didn’t even want to imagine the picture the paramedics had been confronted with. He had felt dizzy when the Constable handed him Arthur’s helmet that had taken quite a blow and then he wanted to throw up when she gave him a boot. One of Arthur’s boots. One. 

All the things were in the back of his car, Arthur’s backpack and the papers that were in it, the laptop he used for work, the folding rule he always used on construction sites, the work boots he wore there. Merlin just sat in the waiting area and couldn’t help the tears from falling, the image of the single boot haunting him. 

After he had identified himself, a friendly nurse had taken him aside, checking some data and then told him that Arthur was still in the operating theatre. It had been hours, what took them so long? 

Through all the fog in his mind, another image materialized. Feli! Arthur wanted to pick her up from school after his appointment!

Jumping up, Merlin fumbled for his mobile. “Leon? Leon…Arthur has been in an accident, I’m at the hospital…no, I don’t know…I’m…no Leon…Leon, I need you to do me a favour….Feli’s still at school. I know you’re on the list of people who are allowed to pick her up. Would you go and do that and keep her busy until we know more?”

After that, Merlin slid into his chair again and waited. 

Once in a while he dozed off in his chair and when he woke up, Merlin got up to take a few steps. He hoped that someone noticed him this way and would give him some news, but it took until after midnight before the nurse came over to him and just gave him a brief overview. It seemed Arthur had had open fractures but at least they couldn’t find any internal bleeding, so it looked as if it was just broken bones. It was still too early to say anything about the healing process, but he was out of the operating theatre and moved to Intensive Care, where Merlin couldn’t go see him. 

Merlin knew he shouldn’t, but even though this wasn’t really good news – good news would have been to take Arthur home right away – it was at least something, so he hugged the nurse and couldn’t hold his tears back.

She rubbed his back. “There is nothing you can do for him now. Just go home, get some sleep and we will inform you of any changes.”

Merlin pulled back. “I’m sorry, I’m just…”

“Don’t worry about it.” She smiled reassuringly. “Didn’t you say you have a little daughter? Go to her, she needs one of her daddies now.”

He was too tired to explain that Feli wasn’t his daughter but Arthur’s. The nurse was right, Feli needed someone now. 

Yawning widely, he made his way back home where he found Leon sleeping on the couch and Feli in her bed. As he moved around, Leon woke up.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you. You can stay here if you want to. Thanks for taking care of Feli.” Merlin said tiredly. 

Of course, Leon wanted to know everything Merlin knew and Merlin outlined the situation for him. 

“That’s all they said?”

“Yes, that’s all the info I got. I have to go back tomorrow after work. Of course I’ll try to call them throughout the day.” Merlin yawned.

Getting up, Leon folded the blanket he had taken from the back of the couch. “You know what? I’ll pick up Feli from school tomorrow again. We’re a good team, she can do her homework while I’m doing some of my work.”

Merlin nodded. “Thank you, Leon.” 

“And you better get some sleep now.” Leon smiled reassuringly at him. “When you wake up, the world will look a little bit brighter.” He put a hand on Merlin’s shoulder and gave it a little squeeze. 

“I sure hope so.” 

Merlin looked around and sighed. The night before, he had held Feli for hours while the little one cried. They had tried to only tell her what she needed to know, that daddy had been in an accident and was at the hospital where the best doctors took good care of him, but she hadn’t been happy about that. 

All through the bad news, Merlin was happy, though, that Feli trusted him enough to cling to him and cry against his chest. He wanted to cry with her but held it together until she had cried herself into exhaustion and he could put her to bed. Then it had been his time to fall apart. 

What would he do without Arthur? How would it go on? His business needed him, his daughter needed him and he needed him, too. There were so many things wrong with Arthur’s body that they didn’t even know if his neck was okay. What if…what if Arthur would never be able to walk again?

A doctor had talked to him briefly and Merlin had been shocked by the extent of Arthur’s injuries. After six hours of surgery, they had fixed his broken arms and the broken leg but even though the doctor had spoken in understandable words, not medic babble, and tried to be matter-of-fact, a few things still rang through Merlin’s mind. They didn’t know about his neck yet since the X-ray hadn’t been clear on that and they needed to wait a few days to find out. The doctor went on about the importance of appropriate gear when biking and that this had been what had saved Arthur’s life. 

The mystery of getting only one boot back from the police had been cleared up. Due to the nature of Arthur’s injuries, the paramedics had left the second boot on and left it to the A&E personnel to cut Arthur out of his leather gear. 

The thoughts started to go in circles in Merlin’s mind. He was so grateful that Arthur had survived this, but what would the future bring? So far, Arthur was still in ICU and unable to speak. Nobody knew if his head had taken the accident without damage. What…what if…? No, he couldn’t allow thoughts like this. Arthur would be okay!

“Emrys!”

Merlin startled and looked up. “Mr. Ackers?”

“What’s wrong with you? For weeks you’ve not concentrated, avoiding overtime and not doing your job the way you’re supposed to! And now you’re falling asleep? I can’t tolerate this!”

That wasn’t true and Merlin’s boss knew it. He might have been thinking of other things for a while and now only avoided overtime to have more time to spend with Arthur, but he had always been doing his job correctly! 

“I didn’t fall asleep, Sir.” Merlin straightened his back. He had been close to falling asleep, that was true. 

“It sure looked like it. Pull yourself together, there are lots of people just waiting for a job like this.”

“I’m sorry, Sir, I’m a bit tired today because my friend had an accident and I had to take care of his little daughter last night.” And I couldn’t sleep because I was worrying so much, but Merlin didn’t say that. 

“I don’t care about what you do on your own time. As long as you are here, I expect you to be rested and concentrated. Is that understood?”

The tall man glared at Merlin. Merlin didn’t know what he had done to him, but from the very beginning, his boss couldn’t stand him and did everything he could to make life more difficult for him. More than once he had cancelled days off last minute or put even more work on Merlin’s desk when he was about to leave for the day. He didn’t let an opportunity pass to make remarks that were all masked as professional orders. The best days at the office were the ones were Mr. Ackers was out on all-day-appointments. 

“Yes, Mr. Ackers.” Merlin had pondered taking a few days of leave but how could he ask for that now? If he did, it only offered the man another reason to pick on him. He hated this job. Which was actually not true, the job itself was okay, the pay reasonable and his co-workers at least not from hell, some of them were actually nice. He’d even escaped the temp job situation he had been in before. What made the job so horrible was his boss, who now gave him another stern look before he walked on.

Sighing, Merlin checked the clock. It was close to noon, he had planned to extend his lunch break a bit and go to the construction site where the blokes were working to break the news of Arthur’s accident to them but the way it looked he’d have to do it on the phone, which he hated. They were his friends, they deserved better than that. 

Cara came over. “Everything alright?”

Merlin shook his head. “No, nothing is alright at the moment, but thanks for asking.”

“What’s wrong?” She sat on the edge of his desk. 

Everything. Everything was wrong. “Arthur’s been in an accident.”

“Oh my God, Merlin, is he alright?” Cara reached for his hand.

Trying hard to hold the tears back, Merlin shook his head. When he saw Cara’s shocked face, he added “He’s still in ICU.”

“I’m so sorry, Merlin. You must be worried sick. What are you even doing here?”

Merlin managed a wry smile. “You heard what _he_ said, I can’t just leave now.”

“It was hard not to hear, he talked loud enough. But your boyfriend needs you now.”

“There’s not much I can do anyway and work probably takes my mind off of things.”

She reached over and brushed the tear that rolled down Merlin’s face off with the pad of her thumb. “What are you working on? Give it over, I’ll ask Sue and Diana, we’ll get this finished before the end of the day. And you go home and take a nap and then you go see Arthur.”

“Mr. Ackers is going to fire me when he comes by my desk again and finds me gone.”

Cara grinned. “He’s out of the office for the rest of the day, he’ll never know.”

Merlin looked at her for a long time. “Thanks.”

Very quickly, he explained the basics of what he was working on and handed the papers over. Then, he took his jacket and backpack and left the office. 

Standing in front of the door to the hospital room, Merlin took a deep breath. They hadn’t let him into ICU but now Arthur was in his room and he could go see him. A nurse had assured him that Arthur was clear and seemed to remember everything but the accident itself, but that wasn’t out of the ordinary. The mind usually just shut down at traumatic experiences and kind of forgot the incident.

Blowing out the breath he had held, Merlin knocked carefully and opened the door a fraction. His breath caught. Arthur, his Arthur, his knight in shining armor, lay in the bed and seemed to be all small and fragile. His leg was put up a bit and there were weird metal things sticking out of it and one of the arms. Both arms were in casts and so was the leg and Arthur wore a brace around his neck. 

Slowly, Merlin made his way over. “Hi,” he whispered. 

Arthur’s eyes were open. “Hi, love,” he croaked out and tried to smile.

Merlin’s eyes filled with tears and he wanted to hug Arthur so badly, just to make sure he was really here and alive and breathing. 

“Don’t cry.”

“I’m not, I’m just happy to see you.” Merlin didn’t want to pull the chair over, he would have been too far away from Arthur and Arthur might not have seen him that way, so he just stood by the bed. 

“Do you…do you know what happened?” Arthur looked at him.

“You’ve been in an accident.”

“I know.” Arthur closed his eyes and Merlin thought for a moment that he had fallen asleep. He reached out and very carefully brushed a strand of hair off Arthur’s forehead.

“But what happened?”

“What? Oh, I don’t know yet, police didn’t tell me and it’s not important what happened. The important thing is that you heal. Do you need anything, can I bring anything when I come back tomorrow?”

Arthur made a little frustrated sound. “Can’t remember.” His throat was still sore from the tubes.

“I know. We will find out. Feli says hi and” Merlin tried to imitate her voice, “’Get well, daddy. I love you.’ and the guys say ‘hi’ and you should get…let me quote Gwaine ‘get your sorry arse out of hospital soon, you’re needed.’” Merlin smiled when the corners of Arthur’s mouth went up a bit. The blokes had already known about the accident from Leon and each had his own way of wishing Arthur well. Gwaine usually masked his feelings with a harsh remark.

“Sounds…just like him.” Arthur pulled a face.

“Are you in pain? Should I get the nurse?” Merlin didn’t like this. He felt so helpless. If only he could make Arthur’s pain go away and everything would go back to normal. 

“Yes…and no. ‘s okay.” Arthur closed his eyes again. His face relaxed when Merlin put his hand near his head and gently stroked his hair with his thumb. 

 

Feli clung to him and cried. Merlin sat on the edge of her bed and stroked her back. 

“I miss my daddy!”

“I know, sweetheart. I miss him, too.” This was the third night that Feli woke up from bad dreams. The accident was only a week back and Arthur was in no condition to get a visit from a lively seven year old.

They had found a routine with Leon picking her up from school and keeping her company while Merlin was still at the hospital and when he came back, Leon left and Merlin was alone with her. So far, it had worked well, Feli did her homework and played and seemed to be alright, but now she had started to have nightmares and yelled for her daddy and all Merlin could do was sit with her and hold her until the worst sobs subsided and she had cried herself into exhaustion. 

Usually, he stumbled back to bed – a bed that was way too large without Arthur being there – and did the same. He missed him so much that it hurt and knowing the state Arthur was in didn’t help either. His condition had progressed in that one week, but he still kept asking for the details of the accident and if police had released his bike yet. Today, though, had been a bad day and Merlin almost ran out of words trying to calm Arthur down and cheer him up a little. 

“Merlin?” Feli sniffled and wiped her nose against Merlin’s shoulder.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“I love my daddy.”

“I know you do and he loves you very much and we will go visit as soon as he’s up for it, I promise.”

When he thought that Feli had fallen asleep against him, she whispered. “And you love him, too.”

Biting his lower lip, tears filling his eyes, Merlin nodded. “Yes, I do.”

Feli only sobbed once in a while now. “And I love you, too.”

Merlin pressed a kiss on her hair. “I love you, too, sweetheart, but you have to sleep now. You need to go to school, so you can play with your friends in the morning, you need some rest, okay?”

When the girl nodded and reluctantly let go of him, he pulled the blanket up and arranged her teddies so she could reach them. “Sleep tight.”

He left the night light on and closed the door behind him. How long until Mithian would be back? It wasn’t that Merlin didn’t want Feli around. There were enough moments where she pulled him out of his dark thoughts and just made his day with her naïve way of seeing things and the innocent ideas she had. From the very beginning, she had wormed her way into his heart and he’d hate to see her leave again. They were a good team. But between his job, visiting Arthur at the hospital and organizing everything, he felt there wasn’t enough time left for her. 

Leon did a great job and he did all he could, but neither of them were her parents. If Mithian knew about the accident, she might be back already. He had never been here when she dropped Feli off for the weekend or picked her up again, did Mithian even know about him? Feli had probably told her about him. How would she react if she found out that her precious little girl was in this house with a stranger? 

As he turned off the lights, Merlin hoped that she wasn’t one of those high-strung types who would sick the police on him for nothing else than taking care of her daughter, but she needed to know, so he decided to call her in the morning.

Merlin’s stomach fluttered. He had contacted Mithian and now was waiting for her to show up. It had been an awkward phone call since he basically had to tell her that he was a stranger to her but he was taking care of her daughter while Arthur was in the hospital. Of course she had demanded to talk to Feli right away and seemed to be relieved when she heard that the girl was alright, even though shaken by the fact that her daddy was at the hospital. Mithian managed to cut her trip short and would come to Arthur’s place from the airport right away. 

Feli clung to Merlin. “I don’t want to leave. I need to go see daddy.”

“When daddy can see you, we will go and visit him, I promise.”

“Merlin?”

“Hmm?”

“When can daddy see me? When will he be back?”

Merlin swallowed hard when he looked at her, watching him with wide innocent eyes. “I don’t know, sweetheart. You’ve been talking to him on the phone but it might take a while.” Arthur had decided he didn’t want her to see him like that, but Merlin wasn’t sure that was the right decision. He understood that Arthur wanted to be her hero, someone she could always count on and who would always be there for her and that he didn’t want to look weak and vulnerable. Merlin didn’t want to do anything against Arthur’s wishes, he never had children and never had to decide what was best for them, but he thought that Feli would probably be able to handle it.

She snuggled against him, so he just took her along as he went to open the door when the doorbell rang. 

“Mommie!”

A dark-haired woman immediately took Feli out of Merlin’s arms and hugged her tight. “I’ve missed you, princess.”

“Mommie, not so tight!” Feli tried to wiggle out of the hold and giggled. 

The woman softened her hold, kissed Feli’s hair and then looked up. “Hello, you must be Merlin.”

“Hello Mithian. Come on in.” It felt weird letting her into the place. She had lived here for a few years. 

“Mommie, come, I’ll show you the pictures I drew with Merlin and we’ve been to the zoo and there’s pictures and we drew something for daddy and…” Feli tugged at her mother’s hand when she finally set her down.

Mithian stroked Feli’s hair. “You have to show me everything but first, I need to talk with Merlin, okay? Would you go and play for a bit?”

Feli nodded and ran up the stairs. 

“This is weird,” Merlin scratched the back of his neck, “Can I offer you something to drink?”

Mithian shook her head. “No, thanks. And yes,” she huffed out a little laugh, “it is. So…you are living with my husband now? Ex-husband.”

“No. We’ve been together for a while and I do stay here once in a while but I’m not living here. I only brought a few more things over to be here for Feli.”

“I’m sorry.” She blew out a sigh and sat down on the couch. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to sound like that. It’s just…you’re a stranger and Feli…” She managed a smile. “She seems to like you.”

“She’s wonderful and such a little trooper. We get along very well. Of course she cried when we told her about the accident and some nights, she wakes up crying, too, but not once she’s whined or thrown a fit or something. She keeps asking about seeing Arthur, though.” Merlin sat down, too. 

“How is he?”

Merlin shrugged. “It could have been much worse. But you know him probably better than me, he’s impatient and things don’t move fast enough for his taste.”

Mithian smiled. “That’s Arthur. Will he recover fully?”

“The doctor’s don’t know yet. He will be able to walk again, if that’s what you mean, but for how well or how much he can use his hands again, it’s too early to tell. He’s got a long way ahead of him.” 

Nodding again, Mithian looked at Merlin. “How long have you been together? I’m sorry, that’s a very personal question and none of my business.”

“About six months, I’d say. It’s no secret and you have a right to know since it concerns your daughter, too.”

“You said you’re not here all the time?”

Shaking his head, Merlin smiled. “No, I do have my own place and so far we haven’t even talked about moving in together.”

“Yet you didn’t run when the accident happened.”

“Why would I? It’s bad enough that it happened and I am right here for him.”

Mithian’s eyes searched his face for a moment and then she smiled. “You really like him.”

“I do.” Merlin smiled back. It felt good to be able to talk to someone. “Are you sure you don’t want anything to drink? A tea or something? Feli helped me prepare dinner, if you have the time…”

“I’d love to.”

So Mithian stayed for a lot longer than she had intended and they talked about Feli and of course about Arthur and it felt as if there was a little bit of weight lifted off of Merlin’s shoulders. It wasn’t because Mithian took Feli along when she left – Merlin missed the little girl the moment she left the door, waving at him sleepily – it was like sharing a bit of his sorrows with someone who wasn’t as close to the situation as he was but still involved. 

When they were gone and Merlin cleaned the place up a bit, doing the dishes and putting away some of Feli’s toys, he had a good feeling for the first time. With people like Mithian, Leon, Percy, Gwaine and the others, Arthur would be able to make it. 

The place felt a lot emptier now that Feli was gone. She called him on the phone a lot but it was not the same than having her around. Still, Merlin liked that he had a bit more time now to take care of other things. 

He spent a lot of time at the hospital, very often just sitting there, watching Arthur sleep. Merlin hated to see him like this. There were days where Arthur was fine – as fine as he could be – and talked and told Merlin about what the doctors had said and what the nurses had done and others where he didn’t say much at all. Merlin knew that Arthur was in pain despite the painkillers they gave him via the IV. 

When he came back late in the evening, Merlin usually turned to the company mail and opened the letters that had come in and read through the emails to decide whether they had to be answered immediately or could wait a bit longer. From the very beginning, Arthur had given him the passwords and the permission to act on his behalf. Even battered up like this, Arthur took care of his employees.

The numbers were easy. Everything that was dealing with bookkeeping, invoices and payments was an everyday task for Merlin. After a bit of reading and looking around in the files, those things were easy to answer. It was the mail that dealt with details of construction, changes in plans and the quality of some materials that he couldn’t handle himself. It was evident that Arthur wouldn’t be back any time soon, so Merlin carefully asked him if he could let Lance handle these things. When Arthur agreed, Merlin forwarded Lance these mails. 

Lance could have just said ‘none of my business’ or handled the stuff just cc’ing Merlin on the replies. He took it upon himself to talk to Merlin about them, explaining what it was about and why certain things were important. Merlin was very grateful for that. This way, he got a better understanding of what the company was doing and why some things were so important. 

For the bigger part, they could keep business away from Arthur while they kept the projects running. Arthur needed all his strength to heal, he didn’t have energy left for construction and Merlin was happy that they could handle things that way. 

It also meant, that he was on the phone with Lance until late and hardly got enough sleep. It didn’t matter, Arthur was more important. 

“Merlin, I know this is probably not a good time with Arthur at the hospital but…we need a decision on this.”

Merlin looked up. He had just gone to the construction site to update the blokes on Arthur’s condition. They had been wonderful so far, just going on, working overtime most days to make up for Arthur not being there. None of them was just an employee, they all were friends of Arthur’s and Merlin was thankful that they carried on as if Arthur was around. 

“From…from me?” Merlin looked at Lance, surprise written all over his face. 

“Yes.”

“Just because I’m with Arthur doesn’t mean I know everything that comes with construction. You are the experts. How am I supposed to make a decision?”

Lance shook his head. “This is more a financial decision than a construction one. We keep things running on the construction site, you keep them running on the financial side. Merlin, Arthur has been at the hospital for more than six weeks now and he will be gone for a lot longer. You’ve kept the company running, you’ve paid the bills, you made sure we got our money. And you’re stuck in that boring job juggling accounts anyway, you’ve said that often enough.”

Merlin blinked. It was true, he wasn’t happy with his job, it was no secret. It was also correct that he had tried to keep Pendragon Constructions alive and running while Arthur was away. Lance had been wonderful so far, trying to teach him everything. That didn’t mean he knew the tricks of the construction business and was capable of making decisions, though, and what Lance had been talking about now was just too big for him to decide. “I’ll…I think I need to talk to Arthur.”

“Do you think he’s in any condition to talk shop?” Gwaine had wandered over. “I saw him last night. It took him two hours to have dinner.” Even though Gwaine’s tone of voice was playful, his eyes told a different story. One they all had experienced so far: Arthur, too stubborn to let any of them feed him, struggling not only with the fork, but also with the fact that both his arms were broken and he couldn’t turn his hand a single bit. 

Percy came over, too. “He might be happy to talk shop. He was quite annoyed by everyone just wanting to talk about the accident when I last visited him.”

That was true. More often than not, Arthur was so frustrated about the healing not going faster and his body not cooperating the way he was used to. So far nobody had brought up the fact that it might never really work the way he was used to, things like that usually left traces. Maybe bringing up a different topic, one that Arthur was good at without having to use his body, would lift his mood a bit? Merlin nodded. “Alright, I’ll talk to him.”

Some days Merlin didn’t even know how he managed to juggle everything he had to do. After his boss had snarled a few more times in the past weeks, Merlin knew he couldn’t afford one more incident and worked even harder. Cara and his other friends from work helped where they could, but they had a full load of work, too, so there was only so much they could do and Merlin didn’t want them to think he shoved all his work onto them. When he worked overtime, Arthur was already impatiently waiting for him at the hospital and of course, he didn’t want to leave him after just an hour. Most of the time, talking about Pendragon Constructions took up that one hour.

Arthur had been very happy when Merlin approached him with what the guys had said. They needed decisions to be made, so they could go on.

“My body might be shattered but my mind isn’t. I’m going nuts here anyway, I can deal just as well with a few things, bring me my laptop, Merlin!”

Merlin had all the authorizations he needed to do the everyday stuff like opening the mail and paying the bills. But he had decided to only pay the wages without asking Arthur for his opinion and soon their daily visits turned into business meetings.

In the beginning, Arthur had fallen asleep more often than not and Merlin just sat with him, watching him sleep. If this was what it took him to heal, he should just sleep all the time.

The better he got, the more restless Arthur became, though. 

“Has police released my bike yet?”

“They will soon, why?”

“Don’t take it to the junkyard right away, bring it home.”

Merlin blinked. “What? Why?”

“I want to see it. I need to see it.”

Merlin knew that Arthur still had no memory at all of the accident and it seemed that he wanted to piece everything together by doing stuff like that. He wasn’t convinced, though, that this was a good idea. “I don’t know.”

“Please, Merlin. I need to see it with my own two eyes.”

“What good will it do? I’m not even sure if I can do that myself. Percy and Gwaine might take care of it.”

“Tell them that I want to see it. And when I’m out of here, I will ride a bike again.”

“Arthur...” Merlin shook his head. If Arthur never touched a motorbike again in his entire life, it was still too soon. Merlin didn’t want Arthur anywhere near such a thing ever again.

“If it’s only Gwaine’s…for a short tour.” Arthur looked stubborn. 

Merlin said nothing and they sat in silence until it was time to go. Merlin had to go through the books of Pendragon Constructions and needed to go through the daily mail, check the emails and he was sure there was a call from Feli on the answering machine, asking when they could go visit her daddy.

Merlin squeezed Feli’s hand. She had been very quiet since they had left the car, pressing the plush teddy and the drawing she was holding tightly against her chest, looking about with wide eyes. She had been very excited on the way to the hospital, babbling away and telling Merlin all the things she would tell Arthur about, but now that they were in the building, her bravery seemed to leave her. 

“Don’t worry, you’re doing great.” Merlin didn’t know what to expect either. Arthur could be in a good mood if his physio had gone well or he could be grumpy and angry if it hadn’t. He was waiting on some results to see if his hand needed surgery again, so it probably hadn’t been the greatest idea to just take Feli along without announcing her or checking with Arthur first. 

They stepped out of the elevator and Feli stumbled along. “We’ll be there right away.” 

Merlin let go of her hand and knocked. The door was open and Arthur was in his bed, his eyes closed. “Look, who’s here.”

Feli hadn’t moved an inch as Arthur opened his eyes. 

“Feli…” A tired smile showed on Arthur’s face and Merlin knew it wasn’t one of Arthur’s better days. 

“Daddy?” Feli just stood there and took in the picture of her father in bed with metal sticking out of him and big tears rolled down her face.

“Don’t cry, honey, come here, so I can look at you a bit better.” There were tears in Arthur’s eyes, too.

Merlin helped Feli, so she could get on the chair and put a kiss on Arthur’s cheek without jarring his arms. “Hey,” he whispered. 

“How’s school? What happened to that test in English?” Arthur smiled at Feli, already looking a lot better. 

Feli still sniffled but then started to tell stories about the kids in school and that she got a B on her oral presentation. 

“You know what?” Arthur scrambled up a bit. “How about we go down to the cafeteria and get an ice cream?”

Merlin frowned. “Is that a good idea?” Arthur hadn’t been in too good a shape when they arrived, maybe a visit to the cafeteria was a bit too much for him?

“Yes,” Feli decided, “that is a good idea.”

Both men chuckled and Merlin helped Arthur into the wheelchair. Feli didn’t take that too well and there were more tears until Merlin reminded her of the things she had brought for Arthur. 

“What a wonderful drawing! Thank you, honey. I will ask the nurses to put it up right here, so I can look at it all the time.”

Feli beamed. “Do you like the teddy, too? He can keep you company when I can’t be around. Or Merlin.”

Arthur chuckled. “That’s a wonderful idea. He’ll make me think of you.”

Spooning her ice cream, Feli told more stories from school and made them and the people at the next little table laugh more than once. Arthur was tired, that much was clear, but he looked so much happier, too. 

Half an hour later, Mithian joined them, stayed for a couple of minutes and then took Feli home.

Merlin took Arthur back to his room, helped him back into bed and started rummaging around, picking up the dirty laundry, putting freshly washed one into the small closet. He exchanged Arthur’s glass and got him fresh water.

When he finally sat down with a yawn, Arthur opened his eyes again. 

“Thank you.”

“Don’t worry.”

“I was in a bad mood all afternoon, but I’m feeling a lot better now. It was so good to see my baby again.”

“I’m sorry that we didn’t warn you, but Mithian called me, asking if I could pick her up from school since a meeting took longer than expected and I was on my way here, so I figured to pack the stuff she wanted to give you and just bring her for a few minutes. I’m sorry that it was so exhausting.”

“It was, but it did me good.” Arthur turned his head and smiled at Merlin. “You always know what does. Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

Gwaine had promised to go see Arthur after work, so Merlin could have an evening ‘off’ – in which he wanted to do the laundry and go over some calculations and do his part of the preparations for Feli’s eighth birthday – but he couldn’t just not go to the hospital. He felt restless and needed to make sure that Arthur was okay, so he went anyway. 

“But I’ll miss my baby’s birthday party!” Arthur’s voice – a lot whinier than usual – could be heard through the open door into the corridor and Merlin stopped in his tracks. They had all been so concerned about what Feli would say that daddy couldn’t make it to her birthday that they completely forgot what it might do to Arthur.

“Will you listen to me now?” Gwaine’s voice could be heard and Merlin had never heard him so earnest and concerned. “If I were you, I would be happy to just be alive and see her grow up.”

“But…”

“Arthur, when I heard about the accident, my worst fear wasn’t ‘Will he be able to walk again?’ or ‘Will he be able to use his hand again?’…Do you really want to know what I feared?” There was a pause. “I was afraid as hell that this accident had turned you into a vegetable, sitting in a wheelchair all day, slobbering all over yourself, not even knowing your own name. For fuck’s sake, man up and be happy for what you have. You might miss this one birthday, but you’ll be around for birthdays to come. So be thankful for that!”

Merlin swallowed hard. Gwaine’s voice was full of emotion and he knew that their friend had tears in his eyes without even seeing him. Also, Gwaine had said what they had all feared. Arthur was impatient and not happy about his bones not healing fast enough, needing surgery again and again, but not seeing anything but his room and the corridors of the hospital, he had started to lose perspective in the past days, talking big and wanting too much. Maybe it was harsh medicine that Gwaine fed him, but Merlin was thankful someone had finally told him. 

Now, he couldn’t enter the room, pretending he hadn’t heard this, so he tiptoed down the corridor to where the kitchenette-area was where patients could get tea and water without having to bother the nurses if there were already up to making their way there. He leaned against the window sill and looked out over the nightly London for a while, before he filled a little pitcher with water, took a fresh glass and wandered back to Arthur’s room. 

More than once Merlin woke up in the middle of the night, his head on Arthur’s desk, the lights still on, where he had fallen asleep going through Pendragon Construction’s mail or books. He had made a list of things for Lance to handle and knew he needed to talk to Leon about a few details that Arthur had asked about. 

It was good that Arthur demanded to be involved more and more. He was right, it was only his body that had taken the damage, his brain still worked perfectly. Merlin had gotten a second laptop, so Arthur could follow everything that was going on and could make decisions when a quick answer was needed. 

Merlin knew that Arthur wouldn’t be that quick in the next couple of days since he’d just had surgery again. He didn’t like that one bit, each surgery threw Arthur back by at least two weeks, but this one at least removed the metal sticking out of his body. He had been there when the doctor explained exactly what else they would do to Arthur’s bones and that they would fix the bones differently now that they had started healing. 

Sometimes he wondered how long it would take to get Arthur back home. 

Yawning, Merlin got up and logged off, switched off the lights and wandered towards the bedroom. In the days after Feli had gone back to Mithian, Merlin tried to go to his own place but found that commuting just took too much precious time, so he had kind of moved into Arthur’s place and only went back to his own when he noticed he’d forgotten something that he needed. 

Quickly brushing his teeth, Merlin looked at his tired face in the mirror. In moments like this, he felt endlessly tired and as if he was centuries old. He wondered where they could have been had the accident not happened. Maybe they were on a nice vacation together? Or Arthur would have found someone more interesting and he was all alone again? 

Merlin shook his head, rinsed and padded towards the bed. He couldn’t waste time with thoughts like this. The situation was the way it was and he couldn’t change anything about it. He loved Arthur and would be there for him as long as Arthur wanted. And now he only had three more hours left before he had to get up again and really needed to sleep.

Merlin started at the letter he had just taken out of Arthur’s mailbox. It had been addressed to him, so he thought it was some kind of junk mail, because nobody knew that he was at Arthur’s house a lot more often than at his own? But it wasn’t junk mail, it was a letter from a lawyer. 

Frowning, Merlin went to the kitchen to take a bottle of water out of the fridge and then sat down to read it again. Did he understand that correctly? There was someone who demanded that he handed all the papers of Pendragon Constructions over since he wasn’t the rightful owner of the company. 

That much was true. But why would he just give everything to someone he didn’t know? He reached for his mobile.

“Leon?”

He waited for their friend to greet him and exchanged the usual pleasantries. 

“Listen, Leon. I got a letter that concerns the company.”

“You open Arthur’s mail?”

“Yes, Leon, Arthur wants me to, but this was addressed to me.”

“To you? To your home address?”

“No, to here.”

Leon laughed. “To here, okay.” He got serious again. “Some lawyer sent you a letter to Arthur’s house, did I understand that correctly?”

“Yes, you did.” Merlin sighed. On top of everything, he didn’t need a legal conflict.

“Do they say whose lawyer they are?”

Merlin skimmed the letter again. “Morgana Pendragon.”

“Arthur’s sister.” Leon sighed. “She’s a tough one. Probably finally sees a chance to get back to Arthur.”

Frowning, Merlin tried to make sense of this. “What am I missing?”

“He’s never told you about her?”

“Just that Feli doesn’t like her to read bedtime stories to her.”

Leon sighed and then took a deep breath. “It would be better if Arthur told you the whole thing, but since he can’t at the moment…”

“Please, Leon, I need to know what to do with this. Is this real?”

“If Morgana is behind it, I’d say yes. See, Morgana is Arthur’s sister.”

“I know.”

“She never forgave Arthur that their father gave him the money to start his business and she didn’t get a penny.”

“Oh.”

“There’s a history to this. Arthur went to school and worked hard, Morgana travelled the world and did a few things that made their old man really angry. So when Arthur decided to open the company, his father helped him, financially.”

“And she got nothing.”

“No, she didn’t. Or at least not as much as she thought was rightfully hers.”

“That must have been quite a while ago. Do you really think she’s still so angry that she tries to get a hold of Arthur’s business now?”

“To be honest, yes, I think she is. It’s not that she wants the business. She just wants to take from him what she thinks is hers.”

Merlin sat there in shock and said nothing. He never had brothers or sisters and he couldn’t imagine what triggered such rage that someone reacted that way. How on earth could you use a moment like this, when your brother was at his weakest, to do something like that? That was really low.

“Merlin, you still there?”

“Yes, sorry, Leon. What am I gonna do?”

“Get yourself a lawyer right away.”

“You don’t happen to know one?”

“I’m not sure if my lawyer is specialized in stuff like that, but if not, he will know someone. I’ll text you his number.”

Long after Leon had hung up, Merlin stared at the letter on the coffee table. Aside from the issue of having to find a lawyer and finding the funds for that, he didn’t know if he could tell Arthur about this. Arthur was in no condition to make more decisions than he was already making and his sister was obviously a topic he didn’t really want to talk about or else he would have shared what Leon had just told him. He couldn’t bother Arthur with this, Arthur wasn’t supposed to get angry, he needed all his strength to heal and get well. A legal conflict with his sister would definitely not be good for this process. 

Merlin decided to call the lawyer in the morning, determined to only inform Arthur when it became absolutely necessary. 

“What’s the long face about?” Arthur smiled encouragingly at him when Merlin found him at the end of the corridor where a little seating area was located.

Merlin leaned in and kissed him softly. “Just a bit tired, don’t worry.”

His boss once again had threatened to fire him when he found out that Merlin had to take a few hours off and Merlin found that he had reached a point where he didn’t really care any longer. He needed to keep this appointment with the lawyer, who had agreed to see him on the same day he called. This was important. A stupid job with a shitty boss wasn’t. 

“But I do worry.”

Merlin chuckled. “Don’t. You need all your strength to heal.” He didn’t feel like laughing, though. The lawyer had listened to everything that Merlin told him and wanted to get back to him as soon as he had checked a few things. 

“I’m doing real good, see, they removed the bandages already and soon I can restart my physio for this arm. The other one is healing quite well and maybe I’ll be able to use a cane soon.”

Merlin smiled tiredly, he knew that that wasn’t going to happen any time soon. The doctors had made it very clear that Arthur wouldn’t be able to support his weight with his arms, much less with one, so either his leg healed or he would be very unstable for a long time. Of course he didn’t mention it now that Arthur was in such a good mood.

They sat in silence for a while before Arthur looked at Merlin’s face again. “You look like you could use a coffee.”

“Let me get the wheelchair.” Merlin was happy that Arthur had suggested it. Sitting in one place for too long made him even more tired than he already was, so moving around, going to the cafeteria – even if the coffee there was crap – was a good idea. 

Arthur was already rather good at moving from his bed or a normal chair into the wheelchair, so Merlin let him do it on his own. He needed those little moments of success and Merlin only helped when he saw that Arthur really couldn’t do it on his own. 

“This coffee is horrible.” Arthur complained.

“It’s what we drink since you are here.” Merlin smiled.

“I know, I miss the coffee from our sandwich shop.”

Merlin pulled his mobile out of his pocket. 

“Who are you going to call?” Arthur frowned.

“I’m going to text Percy, he should bring some when he drops by the next time.”

The laugh that he had intended to share with Arthur died when he saw the look on Arthur’s face.

“That would be so fantastic.” Arthur sighed.

It had meant to be a joke. The coffee would be cold before Percy had even reached the parking lot. Arthur was locked up in here, though, for weeks already. The people visiting were his lifeline to the outside. 

“We can try.” Merlin typed up a message to Percy. “But don’t be too disappointed when it’s cold.”

“It can’t be worse than this.” Arthur looked at his cup unhappily. 

“While I’m at it…anything else you’d like from there?”

Arthur had never complained about the hospital food and when people brought him chocolates and other things, he usually had given them to Merlin to take along, claiming he didn’t need additional calories, he wasn’t moving enough as it was. Now his eyes lit up.

“Do you think he could bring me one of those egg sandwiches? On the little artesian bread? Oh, and one of the special fruit cups, they are so delicious.”

Dutifully, Merlin typed everything up, added a little excuse and the promise to reimburse Percy or whoever would bring the stuff and then smiled at Arthur. “At least your appetite hasn’t suffered.”

A while later, Merlin helped Arthur into a zipped hoodie and they went outside into the little park-area of the hospital. The sun was out and it was warm enough to sit there and enjoy a bit of fresh air. 

“You know,” Arthur reached over and caressed Merlin’s cheek a bit clumsily. “You know I love you being here, spending time with me.”

Merlin put a little kiss on Arthur’s hand. 

“But I think it’s time that you thought of yourself a bit more.”

Staring at Arthur first, Merlin then blinked. “What?”

“You’ve been here every day. You do your job, you take care of me; you even take care of my company and of my daughter when she’s around. I appreciate all of this, I love you for doing it. But you need a break.”

Some days, Arthur was a needy little child, nothing was right and all the world had to bow to his wishes. And now he was so observant and loving that it brought tears to Merlin’s eyes. 

“It’s what you do when you love someone.” He gave Arthur a shaky smile.

Arthur smiled. “I thought…I thought you should probably take some time off.”

Merlin’s face fell. He couldn’t take even more time off. He still needed a few hours to check back with the lawyer and to do whatever was needed to fend Arthur’s sister off. If he put in a leave request, he would basically fire himself. “I can’t. You know Mr. Ackers, he doesn’t care about the situation, he…”

“Not like that,” Arthur interrupted him. “From me. You don’t have to come here every day. As much as I love to see you, I’d rather have you in a healthy, well-rested state and not have to worry about you falling asleep while you’re driving or not getting enough rest at night.”

Reaching for Arthur’s hand and carefully pressing some kisses onto it before caressing it with the pad of his thumb, Merlin sniffled. “I love you.”

“And I love you. That won’t change if you don’t show up here every day. I get so many other visitors and if nobody shows up for a day or two, that’s fine, too. I have my laptop and can annoy you with emails and keep myself entertained.” Arthur smiled.

“Are you sure?” As much as he loved seeing Arthur each day, being there for him when he wasn’t in a good mood and keeping him updated on everything that was going on, Merlin knew he needed a break.

“Yes, I am. And the way I know you, you will do so much work for me even when you don’t come to see me that it’s not healthy. Can’t you at least give the laundry away to be done? You’re working too hard.”

“Ah, that bit of laundry…” Laundry was the least of his problems. 

After some more discussion, they agreed on Merlin only showing up every other day. And when there were more surgeries…and at important doctor’s appointments…and other unspecified things. 

“MEEEEEEEEEEEEERLIN!!!!!!!!”

Merlin had not even opened the door completely and already had a squealing Feli in his arms. He laughed when she put kisses all over his stubbly face.

“Hi Feli! Hi Mithian! Come on in, I just put breakfast on the table.”

Mithian greeted him and then stepped into the place, bringing Feli’s backpack and other things in. “Hi Merlin. Thank you so much for taking care of Feli.”

“Anytime, Mithian, you know that.” 

Feli had wiggled out of Merlin’s arms again and already ran to her room to do….whatever. 

“I know that it’s a tough time for you.”

“We’ll get through it.”

“And I’ve put the burden of taking care of a child on top of it.” Mithian made a face and poured herself a cup of coffee.

“She’s not a burden. We’ll go visit Arthur and if the weather allows it, we might go to the zoo tomorrow. If not, I might be in for the 107th re-watch of ‘Frozen’.” Merlin made a face and then grinned.

“I just didn’t know how to do the last preparations for the project. It feels like I’m pushing her off on you, a feeling I hate.”

“Don’t worry. She won’t even notice, you can work in peace and quiet and we’ll have a lot of fun.” Merlin scratched his stubble. “Sorry, didn’t get around to shaving yet.”

“You look tired, Merlin.” 

He smiled wryly. “You know how it is. Every time you see the silver lining, something new comes down on you.”

Mithian paled. “What’s wrong with Arthur?”

“Nothing, don’t worry. He’s healing. Not as fast as would be normal, but the nurses said it’s a bad year for fractures, everybody needs a lot longer than in other years. Never heard of that before, but they are nurses and deal with it every day, so they should know, right?”

“So,” Mithian nodded, “what else is wrong?”

Merlin hadn’t intended to tell anyone, it was just nobody else’s business. But even though Mithian and Arthur weren’t that close any longer, Mithian still knew about his family. “It’s Morgana.”

An hour later, he had told Mithian about Morgana’s attempt to take over Pendragon Constructions or at least to damage it as well as she could. 

“Have you tried to talk to her?”

Merlin shook his head. “My lawyer said not to. I don’t really want any contact with a person who would do something like this.”

“What else did he say?”

“That we need all the authorizations in written form to make legal what I’m doing or else a judge might say that Arthur wasn’t in his right mind when he authorized me. And if we do the papers now, a judge might say that we used his situation and forced him to sign. Mithian, he can hardly hold a pen, he cannot sign papers, every court in the world could contend that it isn’t Arthur’s signature.”

Mithian sipped her coffee. “Does he know this?”

Shaking his head, Merlin sighed. “He thinks everything’s going fine. Which it is, actually. Lance runs the construction sites, Leon does what he can and the guys put in overtime to get stuff finished on time.”

“He always had this great circle of friends,” Mithian smiled but then her face grew serious again. “But you need to talk to him about this.”

“It might throw him back again, Mithian. He needs to stay positive to heal. You know how he is when he gets angry about something. We don’t need this at this point in time.” Merlin shook his head.

Mithian looked at him for a long time. “He’s so lucky to have you. But you can’t do it all by yourself. You can’t shield him from everything. He needs to know about this, talk to him.”

After a moment, Merlin nodded. He knew Mithian was right.

“Merlin!” Feli trampled down the stairs. “Where are my crayons?”

It wasn’t the only weekend or just evening with Feli and Merlin noticed he enjoyed those times and was looking forward to them. He had a lot to do and went to see Arthur most days, even though they had agreed on only every other day. Feli usually took his mind off things, excitedly telling him about school and her other activities, showed him the moves she had learned in ballet class and tried to convince him that he needed to talk her mother into letting her take riding lessons. 

They were on their way to Arthur and Feli jumped along, her hand in Merlin’s, clutching a few flowers she had picked in the small garden of the house in her other hand. 

“Do you think Daddy will like them?”

“Of course, sweetheart. He will love them, you picked them for him.” Merlin smiled as they entered the hospital and waited for the elevator. 

After a while, Feli sighed. “This takes too long.”

“Should we take the stairs? It’s only two flights?”

Feli didn’t even answer and already ran towards the stairs. 

“No running! Feli, wait for me!” Merlin hurried after her, but she was too fast, giggling and jumping on the stairs.

She was almost up the first flight of stairs when she turned around to look what was taking Merlin so long and missed a step. 

“Feli!”

Merlin was at her in a few steps, but it was already too late. She had fallen and hit her face on the stairs. Looking at him with huge eyes, she started to cry.

“Feli! Feli, it’s alright, I’m right here. What’s hurting?”

“My mouf!” 

Merlin paled when he saw blood dripping from her lip. “It’s alright, you’ll be fine in no time.”

She cried harder when she noticed the blood. 

A young nurse came running from one of the corridors. “What happened?”

While Merlin explained, the nurse took care of Feli. 

“Come on, little one, let’s get you to the A&E. Someone will check you and you’ll be as good as new.”

Merlin hurried after them. Fuck. Fuck. Fuckety fuck. Feli was in his care and he had let this happen. 

The nurse moved them into the corner and sat Feli on the bed and then started to remove the blood from her chin.

Feli whined once in a while and grabbed Merlin’s hand real tight.

Swallowing hard, Merlin held on. 

A young doctor came in, checked on the girl and joked with her until the tears subsided and she managed a smile.

“See, it’s not that bad,” he cooed. “Put a bit of ice on it to cool it and the swelling will be gone soon and you will be as good as new.”

The doctor turned to Merlin. “And I’m sure that Daddy here will buy you an ice cream in about two hours. That will help with the healing process.”

“Dad’s Merwin, nod Daddy.” Feli offered.

“You’re not her father, Mr….?”

“Emrys, Merlin Emrys. We were on the way to visit her father when the accident happened.”

The doctor noted that down. “And where would we find her father?”

Merlin told him the ward and the room number. “Pendragon. Arthur Pendragon is her father and she’s Felicity Pendragon.”

“So you’re a friend?”

Merlin didn’t really like where this was going, but on the other hand he understood that the doctor asked questions before he let the girl leave with him again. “Yes, Arthur is my partner. Feli stays with me for the weekend since her mother has to work. So we decided to come and visit Arthur. You can come with us to confirm this.”

“Merwin?” 

Biting back a grin, Merlin turned to Feli. “Yes, Feli?”

“My fwowers.” She looked sad. “I wost dem on de staiws.”

He stroked her head. “We can go to the florist shop downstairs and get new ones.”

“It’s nod de same.”

“I know, sweetheart, but Daddy will be happy to see you if you bring him flowers or not.”

A nurse took over, asked Merlin a few more questions and then explained the way to Arthur’s ward. She smiled at Feli. “And you, young lady, better wait for the elevator this time.”

Feli trotted along with Merlin and didn’t even want to go to the flower shop. She wasn’t happy that she had lost the flowers she’d picked for Arthur and Merlin suspected that she didn’t want to show that her lips were hurting.

As soon as they entered the ward, the tall male nurse Merlin had seen here a few times, came around the corner. He winked at Feli. “You look like you could use some ice?”

Feli nodded.

“Go, visit your daddy, I’ll see if I can find some.”

Merlin smiled gratefully, even though he felt awful. 

“Feli!” Arthur came from his room, using a new walking aid that went up to underneath his arms, so he didn’t have to put his weight on his broken bones. “What happened?”

Quickly, Merlin recounted the events. “I’m sorry that it happened, I wasn’t fast enough.”

“I waf too faft.” Feli looked from Arthur to Merlin and back.

“Let me take a look at it. Wait, I need to sit down before I can do that.”

For the next hour, Feli sat snuggled to Arthur, pressing the dish towel with the ice cubes the nurse had brought for her against her lips.

“I need to call Mithian.” Merlin got up.

“What for?”

“She needs to know what happened.” Merlin knew this was the end of it. Mithian would never allow him to babysit Feli for the weekend. He was such a bad babysitter to let something like this happen.

“No, she doesn’t. She is working and doesn’t need a distraction like this.” Arthur nuzzled into Feli’s hair. “She will find out soon enough and maybe tomorrow, it will be half as bad and she won’t make such a fuss.” He winked when Feli looked up at him. “Remember that time when you broke your arm on the playground?”

Feli nodded. “Mom waf angwy.”

“But she saw that I had done everything that had to be done and you could come back to the house soon.” 

Nodding again, Feli looked at Merlin. “She doefn’t need to know.” She threw him a conspirational look. Then she sat up. “I fink I need dad ife cweam now.”

“Which ice cream?” 

“The doctor in the A&E said she could have one after a while. It might help with the swelling.”

Feli nodded all serious and wide-eyed. “Id will helb.”

Smiling, Arthur scrambled out of bed. “Let’s go have an ice cream, then.”

When they sat in the little outside area of the cafeteria and Feli was done with her ice cream, already chasing bugs in the park or looking at bumble bees buzzing around the flower beds, Merlin sighed.

“I’m so sorry that this happened. I just wasn’t fast enough.”

Arthur reached over. “Don’t beat yourself up over this. Things happen.”

“If only I hadn’t suggested to take the stairs.”

“Her teeth are undamaged and still in place, the little cuts from where they caught her lips when she hit her face on the stairs will heal quickly, she’ll be fine. Please, Merlin. She loves you, she will spend time with you again. And soon – you’ll see – you two will laugh about the little incident that happened when she wanted to visit her old man in the hospital and ended up in the A&E herself.”

“Are you sure?”

“Sure, I’m sure.” Arthur smiled encouragingly. “She won’t hold a grudge against you and you shouldn’t do that either.” He squeezed Merlin’s hand. 

Merlin stood at the construction site and felt a bit lost. He was wearing his helmet and safety vest, his steel-toed boots, carried a folding rule and held some important-looking papers in his hand, but he mainly just nodded when Lance explained something to the new owner of the place. He felt stupid, this wasn’t his world. On the other hand, some things he had only seen on paper or discussed in emails made sense all of a sudden. Still, he was glad when the man finally left and he could stop pretending that he knew what he was doing.

“So,” Gwaine came over, “what do you think, Merlin?”

Taking a deep breath, Merlin played with the folding rule. “I think that you guys are excellent specialists with knowledge I can never dream of acquiring.”

Lance laughed. “It’s not that difficult and it’s what we’ve done for years. Once you’re in the construction business as long as we are, it will all make sense and will be a lot easier for you.”

“It’s just…I’m not in the construction business. I’m just trying to hold things together until Arthur gets back and I can’t do that without you. So…thank you.”

Percy just made a face and huffed while Elyan shook his head.

“If it weren’t for you, we would be out of a job.” Gwaine said. “Nobody would take care of our paychecks, we couldn’t pay our bills and would have to go looking for other jobs. So…we couldn’t do it without you.”

“Enough of this.” Lance interrupted. “We still need to talk about a few things. I’ve already sent Arthur the changes the customer wanted via email, cc’d Leon, but I want you to know about this, too.” He grabbed Merlin and dragged him along, explaining things and not minding when Merlin asked questions that he thought were stupid.

It was good to know that Arthur’s friends supported him in what he was doing.

“That stupid cunt!” Arthur shouted and attempted to get up.

“Don’t, Arthur, please, don’t get angry!” This was exactly what Merlin had feared. 

The lawyer had called him and what he was telling him hadn’t really lifted his mood. Of course, Mr. Ackers had to choose that exact moment to come back to the office and after getting the bad news, Merlin was also in for a reprimand for ‘doing private business on company time’. He had been this close to quitting. He just didn’t care that there was a paper now that went into his file. It was so unfair. Others did more private things than job related stuff all day long and his boss never said a word. He tried to keep things separate but sometimes, as in this case, it just didn’t work. Nobody else would have been scolded for it. Mr. Ackers just hated him. 

“How can I not be? She’s my fucking sister! How can she try to steal my company while I’m in the hospital?” Arthur ranted. 

Merlin had tried to tell him what the lawyer had said as gently as possible, but there was no way to say ‘Your sister is trying to take over and will use any dirty trick she can come up with to succeed’ without just saying that. 

“Mr. Haverton wants you to sign some papers. He says he’ll also need some reports from your doctors.” Merlin made a face. This was the most unfair thing in the whole ordeal. They needed to prove that Arthur wasn’t out of his mind when he allowed Merlin to take over the company.

“Reports? From my doctors? About what?” Arthur glared.

Merlin knew that Arthur wasn’t angry at him, but the glare still made him feel uneasy. Especially since the answer to these questions was one that Arthur sure didn’t want to hear. “They need to attest that…that it’s only your body that took the blow of the accident.”

Arthur stared and blinked, opening his mouth to say something and then closing it again a few times. “She’s trying to tell them I’m out of my mind?”

“Well, you left your livelihood to someone you’ve only known for a few months.” Merlin grinned. “To me, of all people. I would question that, too.” He tried to joke.

“Not funny, Merlin.” Arthur sank back into his pillows. “You’re one of the most hard-working, most trustworthy people I’ve ever met. I knew what I was doing when I gave you the passwords and the keys to everything.”

“Come on, I never doubted your state of mind. And nobody else did either.”

“Morgana does.”

“That’s why we need those papers. Mr. Haverton wants to come over for you to sign a few papers and to see how long it’ll take to get the stuff from your doctors to be waterproof in court.” 

Arthur nodded slowly. “Give me his number, I’ll call him first thing in the morning.”

“But you need to calm down, Arthur. Anger isn’t good for your healing process.”

Blowing out some air, Arthur threw him a look. “I know. But Morgana has something to her that can make you livid.”

They talked about this problem a bit more and then it was time for Merlin go to back. “Night, Arthur. Promise me to let it go and get some sleep.”

Arthur leaned in and kissed Merlin. “Thank you. For everything.”

Merlin smiled, pressed another kiss on Arthur’s forehead and left.

_It’s so boring here_

Merlin smiled sadly at his mobile. Arthur should be done with his physio therapy for the day and there was nothing much to do for him, of course he was bored. 

_Go outside, enjoy the beautiful day_

In moments like this, Merlin hated all the things he still had to do. He just couldn’t drop everything and go see Arthur. He even had a late appointment with Mr. Haverton, who seemed to be making progress in the case.

_Know all the trees on a first name basis. Made friends with the bumblebees, too._

Despite himself, Merlin chuckled. As much as Arthur liked being outside, he just wasn’t a nature-lover. He liked playing footie in the park or going for hikes – when there were things to explore – or just sitting outside, watching people. That he tried to make friends with the bumblebees was a sign of utter boredom.

_Sorry, love, I can’t come over tonight. I need to see Haverton_

_You like him more than me._

If there were a pouting smiley, Arthur would have used that now. 

_I like you well enough to fight for your company_

Damn, that came out wrong. He hadn’t meant it to sound like…like…

_Okay. You go see Haverton, I’ll try to make friends with Val_

Oh, you little…Merlin grinned. Val was the tall good-looking male nurse on Arthur’s ward, as they had found out. 

_Tell him I said hi._

When Merlin thought that had been the end of their little conversation – one of many they had that way each day – he had been wrong.

_I’d much rather play with you_

_Okay, what do you wanna play?_

_Something naughty._

Merlin blinked. Naughty? Arthur wanted to play something naughty? 

_Did they change your meds?_

He couldn’t hold back a grin. His heart was beating a bit faster. Ever since the accident had happened, they hadn’t even talked about sex. In the beginning, he had been afraid to even kiss Arthur for fearing he’d hurt him. Now they didn’t only exchange quick pecks on the cheek, sometimes they kissed properly, but that all depended on the pain Arthur was in. That he wanted to type naughty things on his phone must mean he felt a lot better tonight.

_There was a big blue pill amongst the others…_

Merlin laughed out loud. 

_They really think you need Viagra?_

_Maybe just for now._

He could basically see Arthur’s face before him, grinning widely.

_Does it show the desired effect?_

_Yup_

_What am I going to do with it now?_

_You could…probably…I don’t know…give it a good lick?_

Merlin blinked. Arthur wasn’t shy, he knew that, but they had never sent texts like this before. 

_*licks from the base to the top and pulls back* Like this?_

He grinned.

_*gronas* Exactly like this!_

A chuckle escaped Merlin. He couldn’t resist.

_Gronas? One of the Jonas-brothers? Gronas Jonas?_

He knew that was mean, but nobody noticed when Arthur was alone in his room while he was still stuck with other people.

_:P idiot. You try to type with your arms broken_

Merlin bit back another grin. He knew that Arthur produced the funniest typos since it was still difficult for him to hold the mobile with the hand that he just had surgery on and to type with the other.

_Sorry. Where were we? Oh… *licks some more*_

_Mood is ruined_

His mobile stayed silent for a while and Merlin set it aside to do some work. He hoped that Arthur wasn’t really cross with him. Arthur was bored, alright, but he knew that Merlin was still stuck at work and couldn’t just call him to talk him into an orgasm, if that was what he needed. Maybe he was just bored enough to see how far it would get him if he tried to distract Merlin at work. 

Merlin couldn’t have had a better timing with finally starting on his report as his boss rounded the corner a few moments later. If he pretended to not have noticed, to be so immerged in his work, Ackers would hopefully just walk on by, not saying anything. But he had no such luck.

“Emrys, the video conference with Toyko has been postponed.”

What a nice bit info to have, but what did it have to do with him? Merlin didn’t have any accounts to manage that weren’t local.

“You always say that you are meant for bigger and better things, you will take part in this. Sit in on it, try to look decent – that tie is horrible, get a better one on your lunch break, can’t have you embarrassing us in front of our business partners – and listen. Can you manage that?”

Merlin blinked. He had given up trying to get a better position or better accounts a long time ago. He hadn’t even mentioned anything lately, he was too busy keeping Arthur’s and his life running. “A conference call with Toyko, Sir?”

Mr. Ackers sighed to make it clear that he thought that Merlin wasn’t only dumb, but also deaf. “6:30, and don’t be late.”

6:30? That wouldn’t do. He had the appointment with Mr. Haverton at 6 pm and that was way more important than Ackers’ petty little games to put him down. “Sorry sir, I don’t have any Japanese accounts, I wasn’t informed that I would need to attend the conference.”

“Oh, so you’re not so interested in a new position, are you?” His boss sneered.

“I am, but this is on very short notice and I have an important appointment with my lawyer at 6 pm. Maybe Sophia would be the better person to attend the video conference?” 

“You better meet with your lawyer. With an attitude like that, you might need one sooner or later.” Mr. Ackers turned and strode along as if he had just won a battle. 

Merlin slumped into his chair. As if the situation wasn’t bad enough. 

Cara peeked over the divider. “Are you alright?”

Chuckling dryly, Merlin shook his head. “You heard what he just said.”

“He must have overheard us talking about your appointment when we had our coffee break. I know you were never scheduled to attend that conference.”

They exchanged a look and Merlin smiled gratefully. Cara knew that Ackers was just an arse and he was picking on him. She’d even tried to talk him into filing an official complaint. If his situation had been different, he might have gone for it. He was a good employee, did his job well, some new customers even asked specifically for him as they only heard good things from others and all the attacks from his boss were uncalled for and plain bullying. There was so much on his agenda at the moment, though, that he had postponed taking any action until after Arthur was back and able to run his own business again. 

Cara was just about to say something when Merlin’s mobile beeped again.

_Came without your help. Just wanted to let you know_

Despite himself, Merlin chuckled. Oh, Arthur.

“Thanks, Leon.” Merlin smiled. They were in Arthur’s room at the rehab clinic, waiting for him to be back from some treatment. 

“I’m glad that you found someone to end this farce.” Leon leaned against the window sill. 

“Me, too, trust me. One thing less to deal with. Thanks for recommending the lawyer.”

“Oh, that wasn’t me. That was my lawyer who did that. I’m glad it was someone who really took care of things.”

Mr. Haverton had been to see Arthur, who signed all the papers needed and agreed to get the medical reports done. He had assured Arthur that nobody who met him would ever doubt that the accident had affected him more than just his body and kept the legal fuss for him and Merlin at a minimum. Merlin didn’t even have to show up in court. 

“But you pointed me in the right direction. I’ve never needed a lawyer before, so I could have easily picked the wrong one.”

Leon nodded.

“It feels weird, though, to officially be allowed to do all those things for the company.” Merlin made a funny face.

“Adulting feels weird sometimes.” Leon chuckled. “I’ve been lying awake night after night when I quit my old job and opened my own business. It can be scary.”

Merlin nodded. “It’s even scarier because it’s someone else’s business. What if I make a major mistake?”

Shaking his head, Leon reached over and squeezed Merlin’s shoulder. “You and Lance are a great team, don’t worry.”

Arthur slowly walked in. “They are.”

“Arthur!” Merlin jumped up. “What happened to your bandages?” His face lit up as he almost ran over.

Leaning in, Arthur put a quick peck on Merlin’s cheek and then headed for the bed. “They removed them this morning.” He sat down heavily and let Merlin shove his walking aid out of the way.

“Looks good, Arthur.” Leon smiled.

“Not really.” Arthur made a face and let Merlin examine his arms. There were fresh scars but everything seems to have healed well enough. “There will be more when they remove the metal out of the bones.”

“Hey, scars don’t make the metal detector things at the airport beep. Metal does.” Leon said and Merlin was grateful for the joke, even though it wasn’t one Leon’s better ones. He knew that Arthur wasn’t happy about the prospect of being scarred.

Arthur smiled faintly. 

“How was therapy today? What did they make you do?” It was a question Merlin thought he’d at least asked a thousand times before.

Leon and he watched as Arthur laboriously opened a water bottle, poured himself a glass and then drank. It pained Merlin to see that Arthur needed two hands to do this, but he didn’t move a finger to help. Arthur didn’t want help and even though it took him much longer, he wanted to do things on his own. 

“Not much different from yesterday. They said that I can go to rehab soon, though.”

“That’s great news!” Leon beamed. 

“It’s probably a bit too early since I still can’t walk without this thing.” Arthur shot it a dark glare. 

Merlin reached over and brushed the pad of his thumb across Arthur’s cheek. “Give it time. Only a couple of weeks ago we didn’t know if you’d walk again at all and look at you now!” He smiled. 

“I’d rather not.” Arthur sighed. “So, what’s new in the real world?”

After weeks at the hospital, Arthur had finally been released into rehab. The bones in his leg didn’t want to heal the way they were supposed to and he just had another surgery on the arm that had the open fracture on and even though he agreed with Merlin that it was too early, he was more than happy to flee from the hospital and have a change of scene. 

So when Merlin showed up rather late in the evening, he was still full of energy and in a rather good mood. 

Merlin went over and kissed him softly. “Had a good day?”

“Exhausting, but yes, good. You?”

“Same old.” Merlin would do a lot, but he wouldn’t tell Arthur that working his own job, then checking in with Feli and Mithian and taking care of everything that had to be done for Pendragon Constructions before he drove all the way out to the rehab center took its toll on him, even though he didn’t go every day anymore. He stifled a yawn. “Tell me about your day. What did they make you do?”

Arthur went into a lengthy explanation about training and progress and how the muscles he had once been so proud of seemed to be all gone.

“I’ll tell Percy, he’ll work out a regiment for you to follow when you’re back home.” Merlin smiled and then noticed that he regarded Arthur’s house as home already. He spent much more time there than at his own place. 

“He’ll be so disappointed when he sees what’s left.” Arthur smiled. “Anyway, there’s this new physio. She’s...”

“Oh, a she.” Merlin teased.

“Yes, a she and she’s really good. When we worked with the…I keep forgetting what this thing is called. Anyway, it stimulates the muscles and the nerve endings, so after time I’ll get the feeling back where everything was destroyed and cut into. So I asked her if that thing is available to buy just like that, if you’re not a doctor or a rehab clinic. So I can work with it when I’m at home.”

Merlin nodded. 

“And she said,” Arthur started laughing, a sound Merlin loved so much, one he had laid awake nights wondering if he’d ever hear again. “She said…” Arthur giggled, “She said: Oh, buy yourself a good vibrator to massage those muscles, it has the same effect.”

A giggle made its way up Merlin’s throat. “No!”

“Yes!” Arthur was still laughing and Merlin laughed with him.

“She really…?”

Arthur nodded. “She did.” 

“Well, then…do you want to do the online shopping or should I?” 

It took a while for them to calm down and even though they had their fun moments since the accident happened, it was liberating to giggle so childishly about something like that. 

“You want me to get fat!” 

Arthur’s voice was somewhere between a delighted squeal and a scowl, if that was even possible. Merlin wondered what this was about, but then he heard Lance and Elyan laugh.

“Percy will work out with you once you’re out of here.” Elyan said.

“You’re not bad at working out yourself, you can help me getting back in shape, too.”

“He’s a lot better making schedules and spotting people but if you want me to be there, of course.” 

Just as Merlin entered the room, Arthur bit into a huge piece of what seemed to be carrot cake.

“Mmmm, this is heavenly,” he mumbled around the bite.

Lance beamed. “I’ll tell Gwen that you liked it. Oh, hi, Merlin!”

Merlin looked from one to the other, trying to keep a straight face. “Here I am, trying to get him back on his feet as quickly as possible and you guys keep bringing him fattening food behind my back!” 

Of course he knew that they brought Arthur a treat once in a while. It had started with Arthur’s request for a coffee from the sandwich shop. The first one, of course, had been cold when Percy finally managed to deliver it. They had switched to thermos mugs, so they brought him a coffee and the sandwich of the day/week/months, so Arthur wouldn’t get too sick of the hospital food. Now, as it seemed, Lance had brought some home-made cake.

“Wait a minute…who’s Gwen?”

“My sister.” Elyan said and Lance blushed, but grinned widely.

“Oh, so you and Gwen…Congratulations!” Merlin nudged Lance. 

“They met when Lance and Percy were picking up my bike from the police station.” Arthur happily distributed more crumbs over his face. 

“Police station…”

“You met her, Merlin. Constable Smith?” Elyan grinned.

Merlin blinked. “She’s…Constable Smith is your sister?” She had been the one to inform him about the accident. 

“Yes, she is,” Elyan said proudly. “I know she got all the pretty genes and we don’t look anything alike.”

“And you two…” Merlin looked at Lance.

Lance scratched the back of his neck. “We met when we picked up what was left of Arthur’s bike. She was so nice and caring, so I went back to ask her out. The rest, as they say, is history.”

The others laughed and Merlin managed a smile. What was left of Arthur’s bike. He’d managed to block out the memory. The bike had been nothing more than scrap metal. Anyone who’d seen it wouldn’t believe that the rider had survived the accident. Police had ensured him that one of the reasons Arthur had survived was that the bike had been in top condition. Arthur had demanded they kept it, so he could look at it when he got back home. Reluctantly they’d shown him photos of it, which Arthur had stared at wordlessly. For two days, he had been shell-shocked. It was as if he only understood then that it had been a very close call. Only then, he had allowed for the remains to be taken to the junk yard and never again spoke about riding a motorbike again, not even Gwaine’s and not even up and down the road he lived in. It had been a few very rough days, but in the end, Merlin was happy that Arthur saw that he had so much to live for that it wasn’t worth taking that risk again. 

He had missed something the guys were laughing about as he snapped out of his thought.

“You know, I could do some magic tricks.” Elyan nodded enthusiastically.

“She’ll love it! She loves magic.” Arthur beamed.

“Gwen can make a birthday cake and we can decorate the place, what do you think, Merlin?” Lance looked at him and Merlin blinked.

“Whose birthday?”

“Feli’s!” The three men almost shouted.

“Her birthday was weeks ago.” 

“The guys had the idea to have a little celebration when I’m back home.” It was as if Arthur couldn’t get the grin out of his face. 

“I don’t want to be the spoilsport, but don’t you think there’s enough exhausting things to do when you’re back? Remember that your house has stairs and no elevator like here?” For days, Merlin worried how it would work out. In about two weeks, Arthur was supposed to go home for a few days before the second part of his rehab started. 

“You are such a spoilsport!” Arthur frowned.

“It won’t be a big thing, Merlin, and we’ll do everything. Lance and Gwen will make a cake, I can do some magic tricks, Gwaine has written a new song for Feli and Percy can make a piñata.”

“A piñata…” Merlin blinked. It seemed as if once again Arthur’s friends had everything under control and he didn’t know if he should be proud that Arthur had such great people around him or if he should feel hurt that he hadn’t been involved in all this.

“We can also barbeque if the weather allows.” Lance was already making more plans and Merlin knew he was outnumbered. 

“And you need to make sure that Feli is busy while we are decorating the place.” Elyan grinned. “Take her shopping or something. You know what she likes.”

Yes, that would work. Merlin was sure that Feli wanted to come visit her daddy once he was home. He could tell her that Arthur was tired and needed some rest – which would probably even be the truth – and then take her to the mall or some other place she loved and when they came back, they could have a little surprise party. “She will love it!”

Arthur stood in the doorway of his house and just looked inside. 

“Come on in, it’s drizzling, I don’t want you to catch a cold.” Merlin couldn’t help but fussing. Arthur had been released out of the first part of his rehab and for the first time in more than almost three months, he was home. 

Merlin hadn’t slept the night before, he had been too excited and a little bit anxious as well. Arthur was his responsibility now. Before, he had known that he was in the care of people who knew what they were doing and who could be called at all hours in case something happened, but it was on him now to make sure that Arthur was well. 

Arthur started out of his reverie. “Yes, mom.” He smiled tiredly and slowly made his way in, took his jacket off and made his way over to the couch.

“A couch.” He said delightedly.

“Yes, a couch. You’ve seen these before, they are for sitting on.” Merlin teased and set Arthur’s bag aside.

“And for lying on and for cuddling up on and for having sex on, I remember.”

“Arthur!” Merlin mock-scolded. “Anything I can get you? A tea? Some water? A Coke?”

“Some water would be great, but I can get it myself.” Arthur attempted to get up, which was a lot more difficult from the deep comfy couch than it had been from the higher hospital bed all the time. 

Merlin was back from the kitchen long before Arthur had even managed to stand. “Here you go. You must be tired.”

Arthur nodded. “I was looking forward to this moment so much. Made tons of plans of what to do once I’m here and now all I want to do is sleep.”

“Then sleep.”

“I’ve missed so much already.”

Merlin leaned in and kissed Arthur softly. “You’re here now, that’s all that counts. Do you want to go upstairs, so you can lie in your comfy bed or would you rather stay down here?”

“Hey, how do you know my bed is so comfy?” There was a sparkle in Arthur’s eyes.

Chuckling, Merlin shook his head. “You know that I’ve been staying here a lot more often than at my own place.” He helped Arthur taking his runners off and waited until he was comfortable on the couch before he spread a fleece throw over him. 

Arthur closed his eyes, a content little smile on his face and Merlin thought he had fallen asleep instantly. “You know,” Arthur whispered, “why don’t you move in completely? Makes no sense that you go back and forth all the time.”

Staring at Arthur, Merlin didn’t know what to say. It made sense and he felt at home here anyway after all these months of staying here. All reasoning aside, Merlin knew that this was what he wanted. He didn’t want to be separated from Arthur for longer than he had to be. Before he could answer, though, he heard a little snore and smiled. Arthur had fallen asleep.

Merlin stretched and moved his head from side to side to make his neck crick. After a long day at the office, he just wanted to go over some numbers for an offer to a new customer. Lance had sent him what he needed and he wanted to make sure that everything was alright. By now he should have had a bit more confidence in his abilities. He had kept Arthur’s company running for months now and he had at least a basic idea about the things he put in submissions. In the beginning, he had just typed up what Lance told him over the phone, now all the special vocabulary and weird measurements and numbers actually made sense to him. 

When he had come home after work, Arthur had surprised him with a home-cooked meal. It wasn’t anything fancy, just some pasta and their favourite sauce that Arthur had found in the freezer, but he had set the table and tried to not make too much of a mess of the kitchen. Merlin praised his cooking skills and loved that Arthur had been able to stand in the kitchen for that long and handle pots and pans, even though after dinner, he had rubbed his arm and gone to take some pain killers. 

Merlin had done the dishes while Arthur, who didn’t want to admit that his little cooking endeavour had been more exhausting than he intended, rested on the couch and then went upstairs to write the offer. 

“Hey.”

Looking up, Merlin smiled. “Hi. What are you doing up here?”

“I’ve been practicing to walk the stairs. I’m slow, but I can do it.”

Merlin got up and went over to press a kiss on Arthur’s cheek. “I’m so proud of you. You’re working so hard. Just promise me to not overdo it, okay?”

Arthur threw him a look but didn’t protest when Merlin wrapped his arms around his waist. “I’m trying. Things just don’t go fast enough.”

“That’s why I’m asking you to pace yourself.”

“I want to be whole again, for you.”

Shaking his head, Merlin leaned in. “First and foremost for yourself. I’d rather have you back in shape a bit later than you overworking yourself and having a relapse.”

Arthur nuzzled into Merlin’s neck. “You’re too good for me.”

“Yes, I am.” Merlin chuckled. “Now go back downstairs…or do you want to go to bed?”

Pulling back, Arthur wiggled his eyebrows. “There’s a thought…” He pinched Merlin’s butt.

Merlin blinked and a slow delighted smile spread on his face. “Are you sure?” It had been too long. Aside from a bit of phone sex they had while Arthur was in rehab, nothing much had happened. Merlin was starved. 

Arthur stopped all motion. “As much as I’d love to, I’m not sure how this should work.”

Knowing that Arthur had taken quite a few pain killers throughout the day, Merlin tried not to sigh. “Yeah, would be kind of awkward if I had to take you back there and tell everyone that you injured yourself again while having sex.”

Chuckling, Arthur pressed a kiss on Merlin’s cheek. “Trust me, you’ll be the first to know when I’m finally up to it again.”

Merlin held on a bit longer. “Miss you.” Reluctantly, he pulled back and smiled. “At least I can hug you every time I want to now, that’s good.”

“Very good.” Arthur kissed him again and then let go. “But actually I’m up here so you could show me what’s happening at Pendragon Constructions.”

“You know what’s happening! You’ve been involved in everything for weeks. You should go and rest.” Merlin protested.

“I kind of took the last couple of days off, so…show me?”

Sighing, Merlin let Arthur get comfortable in the chair and handed the laptop over. There was no use arguing with him. He wanted to be involved, so involved he should be, even though he would be very tired and aching because he had climbed up the stairs. Then again, it was good that Arthur wanted to know what was going on and to get back into things as soon as possible. “Let me get you a tea.”

Had Merlin thought it would be a lot easier now that Arthur was back, he had to think again. Moving around was still difficult for Arthur, the stairs of the house so much narrower and steeper than at the hospital, all the props Arthur could use in rehab were gone or unusable in the house. Merlin admired that he never gave up, no matter how tired he was and how much his body ached. 

Arthur still had to be taken to appointments and more therapy and once again, Merlin was happy for their close circle of friends. They worked out a schedule for their private taxi service, so that Merlin didn’t have to take time off or work at odd times to be able to drive. 

Other things were a lot easier. It was wonderful not having other people around at all times and being able to snuggle up on the couch to watch a movie together. 

“Do we have everything?”

Arthur looked over the coffee table. “I think we have enough for a few movies.” He smiled. “Don’t tell me you made these cookies? When do you find the time?”

Merlin chuckled, refilled their glasses and sat down. “Gwen sent them. She’s a really great baker.”

Moving close, Arthur leaned against Merlin and got comfortable. “The cake she made for Feli was amazing, wasn’t it?”

Nodding, Merlin carefully wrapped an arm around Arthur and nuzzled into his hair. 

Feli came over more often now that Arthur was back, but usually only stayed for the day before Mithian picked her up again. The day before, the guys had gone through with their belated birthday party for her and she had loved every second of it. Merlin had feared it would get too exhausting for Arthur but Arthur just sat in the middle of it and beamed each time Feli squealed in delight. The decorations were even a bit too pink for Feli’s taste but Percy had outdone himself. Who’d have thought that he had such an eye for interior decoration? Elyan made Feli giggle with his magic tricks, especially since most of them failed. Gwaine had brought his guitar and Feli had bounced on her feet when he sang the song that he had written for her. Gwen had made the pinkest Barbie-cake Merlin had ever seen in his entire life – not that he had seen many – but it tasted great and Feli loved it. Leon and Lance had set up the barbecue and dealt with everything that came with it from getting the steaks and sausages to making sure that everyone got what they wanted. The only thing Merlin had to do was making some salads and watching Feli unwrapping little presents. 

When Mithian came to pick Feli up, the girl was too excited and had to show her everything, so Mithian had ended up staying for much longer than she had intended. Merlin threw Arthur looks, trying to find out if he was okay with it, but Arthur just smiled. Especially when he noticed that Mithian and Leon seemed to be in an animated discussion about something. 

“Why can’t they make it so you can fast-forward the warning about copying the DVDs? Everybody has seen this a million times and those who want to do it anyway will not be fazed by a little warning like that.” Arthur complained.

Merlin blinked when Arthur said that. He kissed his hair. “I know, but they think it’ll make such a difference.” Smiling, he reached for the remote and fast-forwarded the trailers when they finally reached them. 

“Love you,” he whispered into Arthur’s hair and Arthur squeezed his knee.

 

“Merlin?”

Merlin jerked up, a sheet of paper clinging to his cheek. “Huh?”

Arthur stood in the doorway.

“Is there anything you need? Let me get it for you, you are only back for three weeks, you need your rest.” Merlin pulled himself up, holding on to the desk.

“And so do you.”

“I’m fine.” Merlin smiled tiredly. He wasn’t, he knew, but he would hold on until Arthur could take over again. 

Shaking his head, Arthur slowly came over. “No, you’re not. You’re working far too hard. You have your nine to five-job, then you take care of Feli when she’s here, you’re working a second job with the company and then you play nurse for me, you need some rest, Merlin.”

Merlin leaned in and pressed a gentle kiss on Arthur’s lips. “I love you. Now go back to the couch or to bed, you shouldn’t be up so long.”

“I just came over from the couch, I haven’t been walking around for hours. And it’s not me we’re talking about. If you give out, too,…get some rest.”

“Just let me go over the numbers again, I’ll be right with you.”

“No.”

“What do you mean ‘no’? We have to hand this in to the tax accountant tomorrow, you can’t pay more taxes because I messed up the numbers.”

Arthur shook his head. “I need you in the living room now. Next to me. I know I’m a bore since I can’t do much more than lay about but…please, Merlin.”

A while later they were on the couch, Arthur carefully leaning against Merlin, who had fussed and brought tea and blankets and whatnots before they once again started a DVD. 

“You know, Merlin…”

“Hmm?” Merlin could hardly keep his eyes open.

“I thought about something. Even though I didn’t want to admit it, I won’t be able to function the way I once did even when my bones are healed up again. I will need help in the company.”

“You should hire someone. The numbers are fine, the company’s doing well.”

“There is someone who already knows everything about it.”

Merlin ran his fingers through Arthur’s soft hair absentmindedly. “Then hire them.”

“I thought about making him my partner.” Arthur looked up at him.

“Huh?” Merlin frowned. Who was there that knew the company in and out? Leon had been a big help, but he never looked at the books and neither had Percy and Gwaine, who claimed they didn’t know how to handle numbers. Not even Lance had touched anything when Merlin had asked for his advice, just helped with the technical side of things. Who else was there?

“Merlin, you hate your job and you’re really good in the construction business.”

“Me? I know nothing about construction.” Merlin shook his head.

“I have watched, Merlin, you haven’t only been doing the bookkeeping. You’ve soaked up every bit of information like a sponge and lately you even negotiated with clients and architects, you know a lot about the legal side of this already. And you look damn sexy in work boots and a helmet, you know?”

Merlin chuckled at the last part of Arthur’s little speech. Arthur was right, though, he had kept the company afloat while Arthur couldn’t and had learned a lot. Was it enough to be partner? To quit his own boring job to work with the man he loved in a business that he hadn’t learned from the beginning? He yawned. “Can I think about it?”

Arthur snuggled into him. “Take all the time you need. But now, sleep.”

There were more surgeries and more treatments but slowly, things started to progress. Arthur was finally rid of all the visible metal sticking out of his body and worked hard to get his strength and range of movement back. He wouldn’t be back at 100% with his left hand, that much was clear, but at least it looked as if the bones in his leg finally started healing back together. 

That also meant that he didn’t need a babysitter all the time and organized a lot of things concerning his treatments on his own. Merlin loved that he got a little bit of his own time back and wasn’t constantly in a hurry anymore. Only then he realized how exhausted he was. 

“Ta-da.” Arthur beamed when Merlin came home.

“What is it?” Merlin frowned. Usually, when Arthur was so full of energy, he’d had some strange ideas and wanted to do too much.

“What are your plans for Saturday?”

Merlin blinked. “The usual.” He shrugged. “The stuff I always do on Saturdays. Why?”

Arthur pulled a folded piece of paper out of the pocket of his sweatpants and handed it to Merlin. 

“What’s this?” Merlin didn’t know if he should trust Arthur’s wide grin, but then unfolded the paper.

“You know how this place I’m going to get my treatment has a spa attached, right?”

Merlin looked up and nodded. He’d seen the sign at the entrance to the building. 

“So I thought…”

Reading the paper to the end, Merlin looked up again. “A day at the spa?”

“Yup.” Arthur smiled contentedly.

“Are you sure that massages and facials, lying in these chairs and all that….that this is good for you?” Merlin didn’t want to be a spoilsport, but he didn’t think that Arthur could go through a whole day of that yet. 

“No; and that’s why I will have some treatment over in the physio department and you can relax at the spa. Get a massage, a facial, go to the sauna if you want to and when we’re done, we can meet at the pool.”

Arthur had told him about the pool area before. He got a lot of treatment in the water and especially loved that it didn’t look like the clinically looking pool at the rehab center. 

A smile slowly made its way onto Merlin’s face. He stepped close and pecked Arthur’s cheek.

“That’s all I’m getting out of this? A chaste peck on the cheek?” Arthur pulled Merlin close. “I thought I’d at least get a thorough kiss for my troubles?”

Merlin chuckled and loved to oblige. 

A few weeks later, Merlin was about to carry some freshly folded laundry into the bedroom when he stopped in the doorway. Arthur stood in front of the long mirror in nothing more but his boxer briefs, critically looking at himself.

When he sighed deeply, Merlin walked in and set the laundry on the dresser. “Hey.”

“Hi.” Arthur turned to reach for his t-shirt.

“Actually, I liked what I saw, no need for covering yourself up.” Merlin smiled widely. 

The hand with the t-shirt sank and Arthur threw Merlin a look. “You’re only saying that to make me feel better.”

“Would I do something like that?” The playful tone was gone from Merlin’s voice.

“Yes. Yes, you would. You do it all the time, Merlin. You’ve done it for months.” Arthur looked sad. 

“And yet…what’s there not to like when I look at you? What reason would I have for not liking it?”

“When we met, I was in shape, I was fit. Look at me now. My muscles have declined to a minimum and then…these.” Arthur pointed to the scars on his arms and leg.

Carefully, Merlin came closer. “Arthur…your looks might have been part of why you caught my eye, I were lying if I said that it wasn’t so. But it’s the man behind the looks I fell in love with.”

Arthur didn’t look at him. 

“Come on, Arthur. We’ve been through too much to let a minimum of muscles and some scars get in our way.” Merlin smiled. “And don’t scars make a man a lot more interesting? Isn’t that what Gwaine always says?”

Arthur couldn’t help the chuckle. “His only scars are the ones he got when they took his appendix out as a kid and the one where he had to get stitches because he caught himself with the hammer.”

“And already you’re trying to out-bloke him with yours.” Merlin smiled and leaned in for a kiss. “And by the way…you’re in nothing but your undies this close to our bed…why are we talking about Gwaine?”

“You’re the one who brought him up.” Arthur protested but then he sucked in some air when Merlin kissed his shoulder.

“You better lie back on this bed and let me check if everything is still where it’s supposed to be.” Merlin nibbled at Arthur’s neck. Damn, he wanted him. There had been some more or less shy hand jobs when they woke up poking each other with their hard-ons in the morning, but Merlin had never tried anything else. He had planned to wait for Arthur to take the first step to signal that he was ready. But now he couldn’t hold back any longer.

Arthur chuckled and then growled when Merlin found a sensitive spot. Reluctantly, he stepped away from Merlin and scrambled onto the bed, lying flat on his back. “Take me, I’m yours.” He exclaimed theatrically.

Merlin chuckled and pulled his t-shirt over his head before he shoved his jeans down, taking the underwear along in the process. 

“Elegant…” 

Climbing onto the bed, Merlin grinned widely. “As if you ever cared about being elegant, Mister.” 

Arthur chuckled, but the chuckles soon turned into moans when Merlin found that sensitive spot on his neck again and started sucking up a hickey. 

Merlin smiled against Arthur’s skin when he noticed that the accident hadn’t affected Arthur’s cock, which already stood at attention. As much as he wanted to go for it, he needed to take it slow. For one, he didn't know what Arthur could do already and didn’t want to hurt him and he needed to make sure that Arthur saw that it didn’t matter if his skin was scared or not. So he carefully kissed down Arthur’s torso, drawing moans and sighs out of him.

He just gave the nipples enough attention, the way he knew Arthur liked it before he licked down to his navel. Arthur had lost so much weight and yet he tried to suck his belly in, so Merlin just caressed this area until Arthur had no choice but to relax it again. Only then Merlin’s tongue and lips travelled further down.

Had Arthur thought that his dick would finally get some attention, he had to think again. Merlin carefully kissed down Arthur’s thigh, not being fazed by Arthur tensing up when his lips touched the scar. He knew he didn’t hurt him, it was just a feathery light touch. 

“Merlin?” Arthur had closed his eyes and tensed up a bit more. 

“Sshhh,” Merlin whispered against the skin and then continued his caresses. He didn’t know how much Arthur really felt, the nerve endings might not have been healed the way they once were. He just needed to let Arthur know that he didn’t mind the scar, that he found him just as attractive as before. 

Very slowly, Arthur relaxed. His cock - that had lost a bit of its rigidity - hardened again and he threw his head back into the pillows. When he whispered Merlin’s name again, Merlin heard the need and want and smiled. 

Merlin worked his way up Arthur’s thigh again and finally gave the hard cock a quick lick.

“Merlin!” A low whine. 

Finally, Merlin wrapped his lips around the head of Arthur’s cock and gave it a soft suck. He loved the noises Arthur made, always had, but hearing them again after so long was a real turn-on. It didn’t matter that he was hard himself, he just wanted to pleasure Arthur. 

After a while of licking, sucking and exploring with his tongue, Merlin heard Arthur whisper “Stop.” Concerned, he lifted his head – a bit breathless himself – to check if Arthur was alright. 

“Fuck me.” Arthur looked at him. 

Merlin took a deep breath. Of course that was what he wanted, too. Seeing Arthur sweaty and aroused like this, Merlin wanted nothing more. “But…how? I don’t want to…”

“I’ll tell you if it hurts…come on.” Arthur urged and scrambled around a bit so he was on his side. 

Reaching for the lube and a condom in the nightstand, Merlin pressed a kiss on Arthur’s hip. “You put some thought into this, haven’t you?” 

Arthur just nodded and then moaned when Merlin’s lubed fingers touched him. 

Merlin swallowed hard. They hadn’t done this in months and he couldn’t hurt Arthur even more. Knowing Arthur, he probably wouldn’t even tell him if his leg or arms hurt too much, he wanted to go through with it, so Merlin tried to be even more careful than usual. 

But Arthur showed no signs of discomfort and soon he started moaning and pushing back against Merlin’s fingers. “Come on!” He demanded.

Rolling the condom on with shaky fingers, Merlin carefully lifted Arthur’s leg and positioned himself. He noticed Arthur tensing when he shoved in and didn’t know if it was the initial discomfort or if he put too much strain on the leg. He lowered it a bit and found a position that made Arthur relax a bit before he pushed in further.

“Merl…”

“Alright?” Merlin whispered. 

“Better.” Arthur panted out and Merlin could hear the smile.

When he was in all the way, Merlin stopped and just enjoy the heat and the tightness. 

Arthur panted.

“You okay?”

Nodding, Arthur tried to shove back against Merlin. “More.”

Merlin would have chuckled but was a bit breathless himself, so he just concentrated on moving in little circles. He knew Arthur liked that and it would relax him a bit further. 

Sure enough Arthur was moaning again. 

“Gosh, Arthur.” Merlin closed his eyes. It had been months and Arthur was so hot and tight around him that all he wanted to do was slam into him over and over again or just stay exactly like this to enjoy it forever. 

“Merl…Merlin…come on…”

Usually, Merlin liked to tease Arthur at this stage to drag it out as long as possible but he was just as desperate. So he finally started moving and pulled out a little bit only to push back in quickly. 

Arthur grunted and fisted the sheets. It didn’t take him very long to come and as he clamped around Merlin, he pulled Merlin over the edge as well.

Trying to get his breath back, Merlin kissed Arthur’s shoulder and after a while tried to pull out.

“No.” Arthur tightened again. “Not yet.”

Smiling, Merlin drew patterns on Arthur’s arm with his fingertips. Even though he went soft, he still liked being inside Arthur and was happy that Arthur wanted to enjoy this connection a bit longer, too.

“Love you.” He whispered against Arthur’s skin.

Arthur tried to snuggle back into him a bit more. 

Epilogue

It had been a rough year. Even after Arthur had finally been released from rehab, there was more physio therapy and treatments. The bone in his leg refused to heal properly, so Arthur would have to live with some metal and screws inside him for a while longer. Another surgery adjusted the movement of his left hand. He would never again be able to turn it all the way, but his range of movement was a lot better than before. 

There were bad days and days Arthur was in pain, especially when the weather changed, but he was a lot more content these days, not always chasing the next order, not having another site-inspection to do right now. He was still not the most patient person on this planet, but Merlin knew that if this horrible accident had been good for one thing, it was that Arthur wasn’t constantly chasing something or other, that he had learned that some things worked a lot better if he waited and didn’t force it. 

Merlin had been happy when he met Arthur and even though he had been in love and just did what had to be done when the accident happened, he knew now that he would stay with Arthur for as long as he would have him. 

He’d finally quit his job, giving Ackers a piece of his mind when he left. Cara had send him a long enthusiastic email, applauding him and only a few weeks later, she called him, telling him that their former boss had been arrested for stealing money from the company. They had been staying in contact and Merlin was grateful for the support she had offered in his darkest times. 

He still had a lot to learn about the construction business, but together with Lance he had managed to not only keep the company afloat, they had gotten some new projects and Arthur just guided him through the first project that was officially his own. It was fun to work with all these talented people and to see the progress at the construction sites and the finished product in the end. 

Merlin tossed the hard hat on the back seat of his car and made his way to the sandwich shop. He smiled all the way; it was so cute of Arthur to once in a while just buy him a lunch there to celebrate the little place where they had first met. 

When he opened the door, his smile widened when he noticed that it wasn’t only Arthur, but their friends, too, including Gwen and Mithian, who smiled happily at every word Leon said. Arthur obviously had decided to make this into a little afternoon-party, which was totally fine by him.

“Merlin!”

Arthur kissed him and then pushed him into a seat, going to get him his favorite sandwich and a juice. It was so good to see that he didn’t wobble anymore and that slight limp was only noticeable if you looked really hard. He came back with the little tray and sat it down in front of Merlin, who was already in the middle of the conversation with everybody. 

“Thanks, love.” Merlin unwrapped the sandwich. Mmm! Salmon! Just like the one Arthur had bought him first. As he was about to take a healthy bite, he noticed that Arthur was still standing next to his chair and looked up. “What’s up?”

The conversation at their table fell silent and everybody was looking expectantly at Arthur. What was going on here? Merlin threw them a confused look. 

“Merlin.” Arthur took Merlin’s hand and Merlin pulled it back to wipe it on his jeans before he let Arthur hold it again which triggered chuckles and giggles from the others. 

Arthur smiled and then grew serious again. And nervous. Arthur was never nervous, what was happening?

“Merlin,” Arthur cleared his throat. “When we met here all those moons ago…”

Oh dear, now Arthur got poetical. Arthur was never poetical. Merlin slowly rose out of his seat, still not sure what was going on.

“He doesn’t get it.” Gwaine whispered and earned himself a kick under the table from Percy. “Ouch.”

“When we met and I found out what kind of person you are, I hoped that we could spend some time together.”

“Hear, hear,” Lance said and didn’t mind being nudged hard by Gwen.

“I was so afraid that you might not want me because I came with baggage.” Arthur swallowed and looked at their joined hands.

“He shouldn’t call Feli ‘baggage’.” That was Elyan but Mithian just smiled.

“Yes, Feli. She fell in love with you the way I did. Well, maybe a bit differently,” Arthur corrected himself when the others chuckled. “And then the darkest days of my life happened and I was sure that you would be gone. It was too much to take for such a new relationship. But,” he looked up and Merlin saw tears in his eyes. “You didn’t run. You stayed and were my support, my lifeline, my reality-check when I needed one. And…I fell in love with you even more.”

Merlin didn’t hear the murmured ‘we know, get on with it’, the blood was rushing in his ears as he looked at Arthur with wide eyes.

“You went far beyond what was expected of you – not that there was anything expected at all at that time – and rescued my company, protected it from my sister and most important, saved me.” Arthur swallowed again and then let go of Merlin’s hand to fumble for something in his pocket. “I’ve meant to say so much more, but…” He opened the little box and labored he sank to one knee, supporting himself on one of the chairs. 

Merlin’s mouth fell open. This open declaration of love was so much more than he had thought would ever happen, but…was Arthur really…?

“Merlin Emrys.” Arthur reached for Merlin’s hand again. “Will you marry me and stay with me until we’re old and grey and fat and whatnot?”

The place was so silent that you could have heard a pin drop and all eyes were turned on them. Merlin didn’t notice, he was too busy trying to process what was happening. His eyes teared up and there was a big lump in his throat. He didn’t trust his voice, so he just nodded.

Loud cheers erupted and everybody in the sandwich shop shouted ‘congratulations’ as Merlin helped Arthur up, let him put the ring on his finger and kissed him deeply. 


End file.
